Life with Lyrics AWESOME Style
by yellow blaze
Summary: Human AU Gilbert is attempting to make school more awesome, but has to visit the principal whenever he tries. Recent events may prove there's more to his reason of acting out than just "wanting to be awesome". Mentions of suicide, but not a death fic!
1. Class Disruption

This fanfiction is written in companion with the following:

Companion fanfiction:

Life with Lyrics- Canadian Style (Canada/Cuba)

Life with Lyrics- British Style (England and America)

Life with Lyrics- Lovino Style (Spain and S. Italy)

Life with Lyrics- AWESOME Style (Prussia/Austria)

Constructive Criticism welcome, k?

Disclaimer: Do not own Hetalia.

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><p>Gilbert rolled his eyes as the teacher continued, in his opinion, droning on and on about a subject they would never ever have to use in their life. He tore off pieces of notebook paper and started making a little arsenal of paper bits to throw at someone, he hadn't decided on who yet, but the Japanese boy intently taking notes seemed like a good target.<p>

"Hey dude."

Gilbert looked over at Alfred blankly, "What?"

"Are we ever going to use this crap?" Alfred pointed out the board.

"I hope not. If I ever use this, it means I'm going to be some boring office drone." Gilbert smirked and tossed his first piece of paper at the Japanese boy who flinched and looked around for where it had come from.

"Well then I'm certainly not going to use it. I'm gonna be a hero. Not someone who uses this." Alfred pouted.

"Is there a college for that?" Gilbert asked, throwing another piece of paper.

"I'll find one." Alfred said confidently, no longer paying attention at all. He snickered as the piece of paper hit Kiku again.

Gilbert smirked as Kiki turned around to look at them and waved with a cheerful grin. Kiku stared at them with a blank expression, Gilbert half-wondered if it was supposed to be a glare, before turning back to the teacher.

"You think I can be a hero?" Alfred leaned over towards Gilbert, his eyes sparkling.

"I think you got a long way to go." Gilbert said flatly, throwing a piece of paper at his forehead.

Alfred stuck his tongue out at Gilbert and threw the piece of paper back, but missed and hit Antonio who was sitting on the other side of Gilbert.

Gilbert clapped a hand over his mouth to keep the laughter down while Antonio gaped at both of them.

"What was that for?" Antonio protested.

Gilbert pointed at Alfred, "Mr. Hero has bad aim."

"Whatever!" Alfred pouted.

"Dude, work on your accuracy before you take on any bad guys." Gilbert snorted, tossing another piece of paper at Kiku.

"Whatever. My accuracy is fine. You moved." Alfred made up his own little arsenal of paper scraps.

"Oh I did?" Gilbert asked in amusement. He heard a faint thump and looked towards the back of the classroom. His crimson gaze settled on Arthur and Roderich, Arthur who was now looking at him and Alfred with a questioning look on his face.

Alfred followed Gilbert's gaze and looked back at Arthur and Roderich, "Hm?"

They both stared blankly at Arthur, who was leaning on Roderich's desk, while the Austrian was busy writing on a piece of paper, more than likely copying everything that was on the board.

Gilbert leaned over towards Alfred, "Do you think those two are going out? They talk a lot in hushed tones."

Alfred looked at Gilbert in shock, "No way, dude. Arthur is as straight as a board, and Roderich even straighter." Alfred burst out laughing.

Gilbert burst out laughing at the analogy, causing the teacher to yell at both of them for not paying attention. Gilbert just stuck his tongue out and muttered under his breath, "Well fuck you." Gilbert leaned back in his seat.

He noticed Alfred was sulking and rolled his eyes. _'The hero is going to have to grow up, too.'_ Gilbert brushed the bits of paper into his hand, about to let them fall to the floor when he looked up at the teacher again. Gilbert looked down at the bits of paper and started flinging them over the head that belonged to the student in front of him, bouncing them on the teacher instead.

"Dude! You're gonna get in so much trouble!" Alfred started laughing again.

"Gotta use 'em somehow." Gilbert smirked when the teacher turned around again.

"GILBERT AND ALFRED!" The teacher yelled, causing all the students to jump slightly.

"I didn't do anything!" Alfred protested.

Gilbert on the other hand was too busy laughing to care that he was being yelled at.

"BOTH OF YOU TO THE OFFICE NOW!" The teacher pointed at the door angrily.

"Aw, man. Thanks a lot." Alfred pouted at Gilbert.

Gilbert picked up his books and happily left the classroom, grinning at the teacher as he passed by.

Alfred sulked out of the room, taking his textbook with him, "I don't wanna go to the office!"

"Oh deal with it." Gilbert stuck his tongue out at him.

"Heroes don't get sent to the office." Alfred grumbled.

"Well then, I guess you're not a hero, now are you?" Gilbert smirked.

"I am totally a hero!" Alfred ran after him.

"Are not!" Gilbert retorted.

"Am too!" Alfred punched him in the arm, catching up with him.

"You wouldn't notice a victim if they were standing right in front of you." Gilbert glared at him. He kept walking, leaving Alfred standing by himself in shock.

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><p>Tried to keep them in character the best I could. Constructive review? :3<p> 


	2. Vacation day!

Woooow. My Life with Lyrics – Canadian Style fanfiction has been on the site for two days, and not one person reviewed it yet, but all the others did. I guess Canada/Cuba doesn't have a very big fanbase? XD Anyway, continuing on (still no lyrics because once again, I had an idea on how I wanted this to go):

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><p>Gilbert sat in the principal's office, humming a tune to himself while leaning back in the chair. His legs were taking up most of the aisle in front of him, not that he cared.<p>

Alfred on the other hand, was rocking back and forth nervously. "Oh man, we are so screwed!"

"Oh shut up." Gilbert rolled his eyes, "Geez. You'll get a warning and be on your way, what's the big deal?"

"I've never been sent here before!" Alfred protested.

"Oh mein gott. Shut up." Gilbert covered his ears to block out Alfred's whining.

"Gilbert, Alfred, why were you two sent down here?" The principal came out of a nearby room and glared at the two students.

"Yeah like you really don't know why we're here." Gilbert scoffed, waving a hand dismissively, "Whatever."

"All I did was start laughing!" Alfred looked up at the principal with a pout.

"You were laughing at your classmate who was doing a fine job of disrupting class." The principal sighed.

"Eh, I've had better disruption moments." Gilbert grinned, taking it as a compliment.

"Gilbert, you are sent down here every single day! What am I supposed to do with you?" The principal threw up his hands in frustration, "Are you aiming for a school record on detentions or something?"

Gilbert stuck his tongue out in response, "Maybe I just like seeing your face."

Alfred burst out laughing again, unable to keep the pout on his face.

"Alfred, don't encourage his behavior." The principal glared at the blonde.

"Consider me encouraged." Gilbert grinned.

The principal slapped the palm of his hand to his forehead and let out a frustrated sigh, "I'm not forcing another teacher to have to spend an afternoon with you because you're on detention. Gilbert, go home. You are suspended for the rest of the day."

"Sweet! Vacation day!" Gilbert bounced out of his chair.

"This is a punishment, Beilschmidt!" The principal yelled, but the albino had already skipped out of the office.

"So what about me?" Alfred pointed at himself.

Gilbert paused just outside the door and overheard the principal giving Alfred a stern lecture before laughing and skipping off down the hallway. "I get to go home early!" Gilbert only paused to throw his books in his locker before starting out.

He passed by the nurse's office on the way and noticed that Alfred's brother was laying down on one of the cots, "Huh. Musta gotten sick or something." Gilbert continued on before stopping and turning slightly, hearing Alfred coming up behind him.

"Dude you weren't kidding about the lecture." Alfred grumbled.

"Why are you following me? And your brother is in there." Gilbert pointed to the nurse's office that Alfred had just hurried past before turning around and walking down the hall.

Gilbert heard Alfred swear and run into the nurse's office, and laughed a bit. Skipping out of the school building, as the entrance was just around the corner from the nurse's office, Gilbert pulled out his cell phone and tapped in a message to Antonio: _**Totally just got suspended for the day. Later!**_ Gilbert smirked and pocketed the phone before continuing home.

It didn't take him long to make it home. Gilbert tilted his head, seeing the car that his mother drove sitting in the driveway. "Hm. Mutti is home?" He shrugged and skipped up the walk, pushing open the door with his foot. "Ja, hello~"

"Gilbert? Why are you home so early?" His mother peeked around the corner. Her hair and eyes matched that of Gilbert's, and she was only slightly shorter than her son.

"I got suspended for the rest of the day." Gilbert shrugged nonchalant.

"Whaaat?" His mother gaped at him, "For what?"

"You use way too much energy for a question." Gilbert stuck his tongue out at her, "And I was disrupting class."

"Again? Can't you just pay attention?" His mother followed along one step behind him.

"Why would I do that? I'm never going to use that crap in my life." Gilbert shrugged.

"You don't know that! You could be at the head of some corporate office…" His mother started.

"An office drone, terrific." Gilbert cut in.

"You could be a teacher…"

"Teaching kids to be just like me~" Gilbert laughed at the thought.

"You could be a guidance counselor…"

"Oh that would work." Gilbert scoffed, the sarcasm evident in his voice, "They never did much for me."

"You could uhm…what do you want to be when you're out of school?" His mother tilted her head.

"Alive." Gilbert said flatly, killing the conversation.

"…" His mother sighed and sunk into a chair, stretching her arms out across the table in front of her, "I'm trying…"

"I know that." Gilbert leaned against the countertop and grabbed a can of soda that had been sitting out. Probably the one he had left on the counter this morning. Popping the top, Gilbert shrugged and took a swallow.

"I just don't know what to do anymore…I've tried every contact number I can think of…I have no clue how to reach your father."

"If he's even around anymore." Gilbert commented.

"He's around!" His mother protested, but didn't turn her head to look at Gilbert.

"Ja, sure. He hasn't tried to find us at all, I've never met the guy, and I'm a sophomore in high school now, that gives a real good sign that he's around, or that he even cares." Gilbert commented.

"I'm sure he cares. He…just doesn't know where to look." His mother sighed.

Gilbert's mother had been studying abroad when she met his father, she had told him. Love at first sight…except his parents didn't care for foreigners at all, and it made their relationship difficult, ending in his mother leaving the country of Germany with Gilbert.

"I wonder if he found mein bruder?" Gilbert wondered aloud.

"The hospital said the father came to pick up the child. He must have gotten that message at least. So it proves he cares!" His mother declared.

"Ja. It proves he cares to pick up one child. Doesn't mean he wanted another one." Gilbert commented dryly.

"Do you not want to meet him?" His mother turned around to face Gilbert, with tearful eyes.

Gilbert shrugged, "By the time he comes around, I seriously doubt I'm going to be here." He shook the can of soda slightly before taking another swallow.

"You still have time! It'll be another several months the doctor said!"

"Ja. Unless the illness moves at a faster rate." Gilbert commented.

"You are so pessimistic." His mother wilted across the table again.

"I call it, realistic." Gilbert threw the empty can into a recycling bin and stretched his arms upwards, "Anyway, I'm tired, I'm gonna go take a nap."

His mother nodded in silence and sighed heavily.

"If you find him, then I'll meet him, if you don't, don't worry about it." Gilbert sighed and left the room. He jogged up the stairs and immediately went into his bedroom, collapsing on the unmade bed that was in the far corner.

"At least I get some extra sleep time out of the day…" Gilbert hugged his pillow and rolled onto his side. His gaze drifted to the envelope that had his test results from a hospital visit a couple months back. _'Of course I would need mein vati for the surgery. Couldn't be mutti.' _Gilbert closed his eyes and refused to think of it anymore.

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><p>Yeah so, that's the end. Longer chapter than the first one was. Review? 8D I took three years of german in high school, and it is REALLY hard not to type up Gilbert's sentences in german. =w= he knows it obviously, but I don't want to confuse readers by having him speak full sentences in german. I know I could always have what the words mean at the end, but if anybody who reads this is like me, and doesn't like scanning down to get the translation and then having to find the spot where they left off again, then they understand why I am not. XD Anyway, done rambling. Is anyone reading this reading the others, too?<p> 


	3. So unawesome speaker dude

Well I got more ninja-readers adding alerts and favorite story, so I'm going to assume that people like this once again. Though I did get more reviews this time around, so yay :D This chapter may come off as confusing, hopefully not. It's going to be Gilbert's pov and Roderich's pov in this chapter. For reasons that will become clear.

Warning: Suicide mentioned

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><p>.<p>

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Gilbert dragged himself through the house, barely finding enough energy to move. "Oh…mein…gott. So tired…" Gilbert leaned his head up against the wall. It was so not awesome that he had slept through the entire vacation day, hey a day off is a day off, and the entire night even. And his mother hadn't even tried to get him up. At least not that he remembered.

Gilbert shook his head and grabbed a can of soda before heading out the door, the last thing he wanted this morning was an upset stomach over eating food. "Such a healthy breakfast." Gilbert grumbled and took a gulp from the can.

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Roderich set the silverware and plate inside the dishwasher and closed the door, "Well then, I'm off." Roderich headed out the door. He had left his backpack at school the day before, assuming he would not have any classwork to take home, and he had been correct. Something he was quite glad at.

Now the morning however, would more than likely prove to be tiring. An assembly first thing? That was just plain stupid. Who would stay awake during it?

Roderich headed to school with a sigh, not looking forward to the meeting at all.

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Gilbert looked around as he headed into the school building, almost missing the notice about the meeting for all sophomore students that was taking place in ten minutes. "Dammit. Why so fricking early." Gilbert stalked off towards the auditorium, ignoring the classmates around him.

It didn't take him long to find a seat, he just sat in the back row on the aisle seat. "Like I'm going to sit way up front for this. Perfect time to take a damn nap." Gilbert settled back and watched as students came in through the doors behind him. He was half-hoping he would see Antonio, but more than likely would have an Italian boy glued to his hip. Gilbert rolled his eyes, how his friend could stand either one of them was beyond his reasoning. One was entirely too peppy and the other one cursed a lot. How were they even related?

"I wonder if bruder is like me or the opposite?" Gilbert wondered aloud, tilting his head slightly at the thought. He couldn't even picture what his brother might look like. "Hmm…"

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It hadn't taken long to find Arthur, his fellow student council member was at his locker. Roderich watched as he put the backpack into the locker before approaching him. Hearing Arthur talking to himself about the time of the assembly, he briefly wondered how on earth Arthur could have missed the papers that were hung everywhere.

"Now." Roderich sighed, coming up to stand beside him.

"Oh of course it is. We're not sitting with our first class?" Arthur asked. Roderich watched him shut the locker door, and was a little surprised that he didn't slam it this time.

"No. It doesn't much matter where we sit. As long as we fill in all the seats and don't leave empty spaces." Roderich commented matter-of-factly. He was just repeating what the teachers said any other time they had an assembly. Why must he repeat it? Wasn't it obvious?

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Gilbert looked up as the lights dimmed in the auditorium, wondering how the students were supposed to keep mingling in if they were going to be turning out the lights already. More importantly, how was _he_ supposed to stay awake if they were turning off the lights already? Gilbert shook his head in frustration at the ebbing feeling of sleep coming over him. He could hear a familiar laugh and looked up to see Antonio walking by with the foul-mouthed Italian. The peppy one was nowhere to be seen.

Gilbert half-wondered where the other one was, but then figured he was probably with the blonde guy he had seen him with occasionally, the one Antonio didn't like for whatever reason. Probably because the peppy Italian seemed to like the blonde more. He shook his head with a sigh. Not bothering to call out to Antonio, because he really didn't feel like dealing with _either_ Italian right now, Gilbert just settled back in his seat again to doze off while waiting for the speaker to start with whatever un-awesome presentation he was going to be giving.

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Roderich sat down next to Arthur, happy to be at least near the front of the auditorium. It would be much easier to pay attention with less people around them chatting, "This had better be good."

"It didn't say what the subject was, did it?" Arthur asked. Roderich noted that he was looking around, presumably for Alfred.

"No." Roderich commented dryly. _'And if you remembered my talking yesterday, you would have known that.'_ Roderich shook his head and looked forward again. He had already seen Gilbert sitting in the back, and felt no need to look around the crowded auditorium to see where anyone else was sitting.

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Gilbert sat up as the speaker walked over to the microphone and tapped against it. The dull noise echoed and Gilbert winced. Just what he needed, a headache.

"Can I have your attention?"

Gilbert rolled his eyes, "As if you don't already have it." He was happy to see at least that he was sitting mostly by himself. The closest student to him was sitting about five seats away. Even better, it wasn't someone he knew so he could sleep if this turned out to be completely boring.

"I understand some of you would much rather be in class right now…some of you would rather not be in school at all…some of you would do anything to get out of class…" The speaker started.

Gilbert leaned back in his seat. Definitely going to be a boring presentation.

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Roderich stifled a laugh at Arthur's comment on how some speakers would make things drag on for no reason. He had to admit, the Englishman did have a point. Some speakers just could not make things short. They had to go on and on about the same subject when they could have settled the matter in five minutes. This was obviously one of them.

"And there is a minority of you…sitting in this room at this very moment…who wouldn't want to be here or anywhere at all."

Roderich winced and slumped back in his seat with a large sigh, "This is one of _those_ speakers, isn't it?" He was referring to, of course, the ones who went around speaking about suicide prevention, though apparently Arthur didn't realize this, judging by the look of bewilderment he was now getting.

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"I know to many of you, this may seem like a big joke, but I assure you, this is no laughing matter. The teenage suicide rate has increased this past year, and there are many speakers going around to different schools to try and educate the student body to be more attentive of their surroundings."

Gilbert just gaped at the speaker. How was he supposed to sleep through this? It was depressing! Any sleep gotten during this would not give him any relief from his tiredness.

"Every single teenage suicide can be prevented. Look at your fellow students around you. How many of you talked to, on a daily basis? How many of the students around you, do you notice, but never bother to do anything about, walk by themselves to every class? Who don't have friends to talk to like you might?"

Gilbert glanced around him, but couldn't care less about who he looked at. He couldn't see anyone that he had talked to, much less cared to talk to. And if he didn't talk to them, how was he supposed to know if they had friends or not? Was he supposed to be psychic or something? Gilbert just rolled his eyes again.

"Would you notice, if that one person you never spoke to, stopped coming to school? If they never showed up again to class, would you wonder why?"

Sure he would notice if that one head belonging to a student he's never seen before was gone. He would notice that right away. AS IF. Gilbert slapped a hand to his forehead, letting out a frustrated groan. This clearly was not going to bode well for his morning.

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"How many of your classmates suffer in silence because they don't want to burden their troubles on someone else?"

Roderich shook his head in frustration. This was annoying beyond belief. How many different questions was the speaker going to ask now? He heard Arthur say something, but didn't catch what it was. He ran a hand briefly through his hair before returning his attention to the person on stage. Do they seriously pay someone for this?

"You alone, can make a difference in one student's life. Just by reaching out to them and saying hello, you could change their mind for one day."

Roderich leaned over towards Arthur, "Hello. Can I leave now?"

Hearing his friend stifle laughter, Roderich smiled and continued listening.

"You can prevent acts of suicide just by keeping your eyes open and staying alert to your surroundings. Report any suspicious activity of another student to a teacher. If you see someone by themselves in the hall, say hello when you pass by. Don't just ignore them. Making them feel like they don't exist is the worst thing you can do to a person."

"How many people do we have to say hello to? Every single person? That's tedious." Roderich sighed, "If they're by themselves, then yes fine, say hello, but not to every single person you pass in the hallway. That's just ridiculous."

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Gilbert couldn't have been more ecstatic to get out of that stuffy dark room. Not only was the presentation boring, but it just _had_ to be about the rate of teenage suicide. "If I ever have to sit through that again, I'm going to be tempted to off myself." Gilbert grumbled, stalking away from the auditorium. He was only half-joking. Obviously they didn't think about the content of their speeches before starting to give them. They could seriously offend someone with a speech like that.

'_And some of us would absolutely _love_ the chance to be able to live. Why would someone go off and make a decision like that anyway? Go talk to someone, sure the guidance counselors are crap, and their parents are probably never home, and who would want to tell a sibling something like that…well it's no wonder they get all depressed.'_ Gilbert rolled his eyes at his way of thinking. He knew it was screwed up, but who could blame him? He was already sentenced to die. That had pretty much corrupted his way of thinking and made him completely cynical.

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Roderich fumed as he left the auditorium, "It lasted for three hours! Three! We could have been in class that entire time! What a waste!" Roderich snapped, stalking past him, "That was the worst time of my life!"

He didn't notice that Arthur had grown quiet behind him, and was completely absorbed in complaining to notice the change in friend's demeanor.

"Arthur, I will see you later, I am going to my next class." Roderich stormed off without waiting for a response.

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><p>.<p>

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So that's it for this one. Sorry for those of you who read or are going to read Arthur's companion fic, double the Roderich. I tried to skip over the points that were already in that one so you don't have to read the same things twice, but there was no way around the speaker repeating. Sorry! Anyway, leave me a review? :D


	4. Not related to that stiff!

I got more "subscribed to story alerts" with this one. I got one review to this one I think for the last chapter, and I love that reviewer. Very much so. So yeah, the reviewer brought up and interesting question and I will answer it here for anyone else who was wondering but doesn't like giving me a review for some reason:

Gilbert's illness does not have a name and was not modeled after any illness in the real world. :T I added it in there because I can and my lack of medical/historical knowledge may have been a contributing factor to that.

Moving on:

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><p>.<p>

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Gilbert leaned against a random locker as crowds of students went by. There was no way he was going into the cafeteria now, way too much close togetherness with people less awesome than him. Okay so maybe crowds made him a little claustrophobic, but he could handle it. Just not when they're all in lunch rush mode. So he waited.

He tapped his shoe up against the locker, his gaze drifting here and there among the crowd. His crimson gaze caught on to Ludwig who was apparently standing with his…father. Okay then. Never seen a guy with long hair like that. And apparently an overdoting father who brings in his son's lunch. Gilbert resisted the urge to laugh out loud at Ludwig's obvious embarrassment. That scene was hilarious!

Gilbert couldn't suppress the grin however. The crowds were going down somewhat, and now he could even hear what they were saying. Hey, it wasn't eavesdropping, not his fault they were standing within his hearing range. Oh and apparently they were speaking german. Mixed german.

"Ja, Vati. Thank you."

Gilbert saw Ludwig look in the lunch bag and smirked. What, was he worried something was going to leap out and attack him or something? That or it was inedible.

"Did I make that right? I tried to cook them the right way, but honestly your mother did a better job of that than me."

That apparently was an awkward subject.

"Well she's not here right now, and I've never had her cooking anyway. Your cooking tastes fine." Wow. Nice brush-off.

Gilbert tilted his head slightly. Something sounded familiar about this conversation. But he couldn't quite figure out what.

"Someday you'll have her cooking." He bounced back fast.

"Ja. Someday. Whenever you find her again." Ludwig said flatly. He sounded like he was accusing him.

"As long as she still has my necklace, I will find her, danke." That retort sounded as cold as Ludwig's! Are these people even friendly towards each other?

_Wait. Necklace?_

"So you're looking for an albino woman with hair she could have cut, she might wear glasses or contacts now, and you're counting on her to wear a necklace that's almost twenty years old?" Ludwig just stared.

_Oh. Mein. Gott._

Gilbert felt as if his stomach had just plummeted. _They were here the whole time. I am NOT_ _related to that stiff!_

"She would never cut her hair, she even said that herself. Her vision was perfect then, and more than likely perfect now. And she wore that necklace every day."

Gilbert probably would have laughed at the cold air that was now in the hallway if he wasn't feeling so sick to his stomach all of a sudden.

"Whatever. I'm not talking about this here." Ludwig just turned and walked into the cafeteria.

Clearly these two had issues. And clearly, his awesome self, was NOT going to add to them. Gilbert just stared at his dad as the male turned and walked away. It was rather funny. Ludwig looked so much like his dad, and Gilbert was the male version of his mother. Actually it was pretty hilarious. You'd never know they were related.

_Thank you for that._ Gilbert sent up a silent prayer and shook his head, leaning against the locker to recover from the shock he'd just had. _'Okay. So the love of mother's life, has been trying to find her this entire time apparently. Great. Happy life to them all.'_ Gilbert blinked as he heard a happy voice come singing down the hallway. Okay. An annoying-and-entirely-too-cheerful voice. He looked up and, how did he guess, Feli was skipping towards the cafeteria doors.

"Hey Feliciano." Gilbert followed him in the doors.

"Oh hi, Gilbert!" Feli smiled at him cheerfully, "Are you just coming in, too? Antonio would probably love for you to sit with us!"

"No can do." Gilbert shrugged, "I'm leaving early, I just wanted to ask you a question, you're friends with the blonde german right?"

"Luddy? Yeah." Feli smiled.

_Luddy?_ It took all of Gilbert's composure to not completely bust up laughing. "Yeah sure, him. What's his last name?"

"Beilschmidt." Feli tilted his head, "Why?"

"Meh, just curious. Never heard it." Gilbert shrugged, "Your line is going down." He turned his head to see Antonio waving at him and waved back.

Feli perked up at the shortening line for the pasta bar and quickly ran off towards it, completely forgetting about the question Gilbert asked, which was fine with him.

Gilbert walked off towards Antonio, and promptly tousled the male's head upon reaching him, "Yo."

He smirked at Antonio's sleepy looking smile and response, ""Heyyyyy, you can sit with us~!"

"Nah. I'm heading home." Gilbert shook his head slightly. He always got the same lunch invite, and most times accepted it, today however, he was not feeling up to any more teachers.

"Whaaat? Second day in a row, are you sick?"

Gilbert blanked for a moment at the look he was getting from Antonio, "I'm not sick, dummkopf." Gilbert hit him on the head for even asking the question. His gaze drifted slightly to Lovino, who was now sitting with his head resting on the table. _'He's the one who looks sick.'_

"The principal doesn't like me, see you later." Gilbert gave a wave of his hand to Antonio. He walked by Lovino, patting the Italian sympathetically on the shoulder before continuing on his way, completely ignoring Ludwig. Just because he found out they were related, did not mean he was required to talk to him.

Gilbert stretched his arms upwards, whistling quietly while exiting the overcrowded lunchroom. Home was sounding like a good place to be. However…Gilbert turned to see a teacher following him, "What?"

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><p>Ta-da. Another chapter written and done. = w = Leave me a review? :D<p> 


	5. School is going to be so boring now

I ove you guys. I got more reviews this time around! Um…this is gonna make it a little hard to put this chapter up now. So hey, this chapter isn't going to be in Gilbert's POV, this one is a Roderich-chapter. I know, he was hardly ever mentioned with Gilbert, except in England's fic, sorry. That'll change. You'll find out why shortly. Sorry in advance. Also, timeskip to next day.

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><p>.<p>

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Roderich stood leaning up against his locker. He still hadn't seen Arthur. He scanned the hallways for students coming in, but none of them were his friend from student council. Definite lack of Albino as well, but then again, Gilbert was usually late to school. So that was no surprise. A let down maybe, but no surprise. He sighed a bit. He was hoping to see Arthur this morning to talk to him. _So much for organizing those file drawers._ Roderich shook his head. They would have to do it after school.

"_Attention all sophomore students. Please report to the auditorium at this time. This is a mandatory assembly. All sophomore students, report to the auditorium immediately."_

Roderich looked up at the speakers in confusion. They hadn't received any word of this the day before. What assembly was this about? It had to be an emergency or something of importance. Especially since they said mandatory.

So Roderich went off towards the auditorium. He'd have to talk to Arthur later. He looked around the hallway once more, but still didn't see his friend. Roderich sighed and headed inside. _Feels like I was just in here._ Roderich walked down the aisle and chose a seat near the front. Not directly in the front row, but close enough. He didn't need to be deafened by the microphone.

Roderich tapped his foot on the floor impatiently waiting for everyone to file in. The lights were dimming as a warning, and it bothered his eyes to have the lights constantly changing. Roderich glanced around him, but still no sign of either person he had been looking for. Oh well. He could sit by himself. Sitting next to Gilbert during an assembly like this would making listening impossible anyhow. Roderich let out a sigh of relief as the lights dimmed and stayed dim. Finally.

He was surprised to see the principal walk out onto the stage, and watched as he tapped the microphone for a sound check. It most definitely was important if the principal was addressing them.

"Good morning, students… and parents. This is probably going to be a wake-up call for many of you." The principal started.

Roderich looked around and noticed adults were also sitting in the auditorium. Why hadn't he noticed that before?

"Yesterday morning, there was an assembly for every grade in this school. This assembly was about teenage depression and suicide. Parents, you may or may not have heard about this from your child. This grade, that is sitting in front of me now, did not handle it very well. Many of you thought it was one big joke."

Roderich looked back at the principal in confusion. What was this about? Was he seriously going to lecture them on taking it lightly?

"Many of you, didn't take what that speaker said to heart. You didn't think about the classmates around you that might react badly to it. Unfortunately, there were several of you who did."

Roderich heard nothing but silence after that. Well who would talk after something like that was said? It made it sound as if someone had taken it too far. And several? That did not indicate anything good, not by any standards.

"Yesterday, that guest speaker we had, told you to look around you, and asked you to think about that one person that may have been sitting near you. What you would think, if that person never came back to this school again."

Roderich frowned. He remembered that. How could he not? It was certainly a memorable point in the speech. It made you think for a minute or two.

"Now I am telling you to look around you. Look at everyone that is sitting around you. Do you notice anything wrong?"

Roderich looked around him. There were a few faces he recognized, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary. No one seemed overly upset or anything, at least not that he could see.

"This morning I received a phone call. It was not a pleasant phone call. It was one that not one person in this room would ever hope to receive in their entire lifetime. It was a phone call that cut short four of your classmates' lives."

Roderich stared at the principal in disbelief. This was a joke, wasn't it? How was it even possible to have four students all gone in the same night? That was just…impossible.

"And now…with the acceptance I have received from their parents, I would like you all to pay respect to the classmates that you couldn't while they were alive. Each of these students, wrote a note that was found with them, that said why they did what they did. I have the approval to read these notes and I fully intend to."

Roderich ran a hand through his hair in frustration. This was not a good morning. He was sure there were other people, four families in fact, that were having much worse mornings, however.

The principal pulled some papers out from the podium he was standing at and tapped them on the top of it. "The first letter reads as follows…"

As he was reading, a screen projector brought up a picture on the black curtain. Roderich stared at the picture in silent shock. He couldn't get any part of him to move or even protest.

"My name is Arthur Kirkland. I am full well aware that by the time that someone reads this, I will no longer be here. I hear people all the time criticizing those of who live in depression saying 'we don't know how much we have to live for'. Maybe we don't know that, and maybe it's because we don't know it that we make such a drastic decision. My life was no hardship for me to survive through, and just because I had a certain person make fun of me almost every day wasn't the main reason for me to go through with this. It wasn't because of my family, who I love so much. It was because of what I went through every day at this school. Every day I see the same person smiling at some other person. Every day I try my best to focus on something else other than that one person. And every day I fail. Every day I felt myself fall deeper into the depression that I could not get out of. I refuse to be a hardship for my family or my friends. I will not let myself drag them down with me. I will leave this world and know that they will move on, and will be happy."

Roderich continued staring at the picture, barely hearing a word of the letter that was read. Arthur was gone? He…actually did something like that? He never even noticed something was wrong yesterday!

"End of letter." The principal said quietly.

Roderich looked around him desperately, but saw no signs of Alfred. _He's okay right?_

"My name is Lovino Vargas."

Roderich heard someone cry out at that one. More than likely a close friend. Or someone who thought they were a close friend. Roderich shook his head and continued looking around for Alfred. Normally the blonde was easy to spot!

"I know that people took that assembly as a joke. But it really wasn't one. It wasn't even something to be laughed at. I don't know how people could laugh at that in the first place! But they did. That was all I heard today. Was laughter. That assembly was meant to wake us up. And it did to a few of us. And that few of us were the ones that everyone else was supposed to be watching for. What are we supposed to do? We were being laughed at and made fun of. Every day. This isn't something I can come to school for. This isn't worth living my life for. Not to be made fun of for something I can't control. I'm out of here. Maybe I can watch all of you and see if you all actually grow up or not. I hear adults saying they have a ray of sunshine in their lives, there was nothing but blue skies their entire life. I see a lot of gray clouds…and no sun. I don't get what the saying is supposed to mean exactly but…I'm pretty sure that life isn't supposed to have such a depressing outlook to it. I refuse to keep waking myself up every day to know that when I get to school, I will be laughed at for suffering from depression. They may not know who specifically we are, but we know. And it still hurts."

Roderich looked back front again, biting his lip. He, personally, absolutely _detested_ being made fun of or being laughed at. That much, he understood. But it certainly wasn't going to make him go to something that extreme.

"End of letter." The principal said quietly. Roderich followed the principal's gaze up to where there were now two pictures displayed. Both school photos.

"My name is Matthew Williams."

_Alfred is not okay. Alfred is definitely not okay._ Roderich shook his head fervently. This was just a really bad nightmare he would wake up from soon, right?

"I'm sure whoever is reading this note probably has no idea who I even am. Because every day when I come to school, I don't exist. My classmates don't see me, if they hear my name being called during roll call; they think I'm a transfer student. My brother is probably the most popular athlete here, but nobody remembers his twin brother. Nobody cares."

_How can someone even live like that? Why didn't he go to guidance…the office…somewhere to get help? Before…this._ Roderich looked up at Matthew's picture. Once again, school photo. One major difference: no smile. No smile, at all. Not even a glimpse of one.

"That assembly we had…I actually thought it was rather pointless. The only way people are going to learn is if they want to learn. If they have a reason to benefit from the experience, they will learn from it. Nobody had any reason to listen or pay attention to that speaker, so why would they? They'd rather laugh at it. I don't know what to do anymore. I tried to speak up more, tried to make friends…but I wound up getting hurt each time. So I'm going to do the rest of the world a favor, and leave it. I was an invisible person while I was alive, I might as well be a ghost and not exist at all. I'm sick of trying." The principal looked up once more, "End of letter."

Roderich slumped down in his seat. No point in even looking for Alfred, he probably wasn't even here. Not after that. Was the assembly really pointless though? Sure it was depressing and people were making fun of it…but…still. It did open some people's eyes…they just didn't say anything.

"The last letter I have, is not a suicide letter. It is one that one of your classmates wrote because he was dying of an illness. And has been for the past year. He passed away overnight, but wanted his mother to give this letter for his classmates to hear."

Roderich sat up once more. This was a letter different from the others at least. Sure it was still heartbreaking to some family, no doubt in the room, but at least it wasn't a suicide!

"So, as written, unfortunately…I knew he hated me. Uhm…" The principal held the letter out at arm's length attempting to squint to read the handwriting.

Roderich looked at the principal in confusion. _He hated the principal? Who on earth was that?_

"To my awesome friends and not so awesome classmates. This is Gilbert in case you couldn't tell. Yeah so I won't be coming to that stupid school anymore, permanent vacation for me! So I'm sure Mr. Principal already told you that I was sick for the past year, yada yada. Yeah I was. Nobody noticed, thankfully. I swear if one more person asked if I was sick I was going to punch them in the face. But hey, no depressing comments here. I had an awesome life, thanks to my friends who kept me laughing, and even though I have a school record a mile long, I'm not holding any grudges to any completely unawesome teachers who couldn't laugh a little. There are some serious stiffs around here! Anyway, I'm outta here. I'll see you all on the other side. My awesome self is going to sleep now, and I already know I'm not going to wake up. I'm so damn tired it's not even funny. So this is the awesome me, saying goodbye to you all. Later~!" The principal shook his head, "End of letter."

Roderich slumped back down in his seat again. Well. That felt as if a cold bucket of water had just been dumped on his head. Gilbert had a terminal illness? You wouldn't know it from the way he was behaving. Not even from the letter. Except for the hints at dying, you wouldn't have known it. He always had…life in his eyes. And energy. Boundless energy.

"Your four classmates are gone from this world. And have left behind words for you to react on yourselves. This is your life to live. No one can make decisions for you. You react how you want to…but have the common decency to realize there are people around you who can be hurt by what you said." The principal stepped back from the podium and looked up at the four pictures.

Roderich looked up at Gilbert's picture. He knew the albino hadn't bothered to show up for the school picture day. This must have been a private photo sent in. Judging by Gilbert sticking his tongue out at the camera, a close friend or family member took it. It was a very Gilbert-like picture however.

"You lost four classmates in one night. For that reason, school will be dismissed for the sophomore class for the duration of the day. There will however, be memorials in the lobby for each student. Feel free to sign your names and write a message if you want to." The principal walked off the stage.

Roderich slid out of the row he was sitting in and exited the auditorium long before most students had even gotten up out of their seats. He walked quietly into the lobby and noticed Alfred exiting out the door. Judging by the black ink on each memorial, he had written something to all of them.

Roderich looked down at the markers before writing a message on Arthur's and Gilbert's. He wasn't sure what to write on Matthew's or Lovino's, since he really didn't know them all that well. Finally, he decided to go with 'R.I.P.'. Better to write something than nothing. Roderich laid the pen down and shook his head. Giving one last glance at the four pictures, Roderich turned and headed for the doors, following Alfred's footsteps.

_**Arthur- I guess I was a really bad friend, wasn't I? I was too busy to even notice you were upset. I'm sorry.**_

_**Gilbert- You always had such an energetic personality. I never would have guessed you were in pain. I know we hardly ever spoke but…you're going to be missed around here. It's going to be much quieter. And a little boring.**_

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><p>So there it was! I think I missed the mark on Roderich's character, did the best I could, sorry. X_X Anyway, ignoring the fact that this chapter was seriously depressing, and anyone reading all of them has to read the letters four times, leave me a review? 8D<p> 


	6. Awesome Mission For Change Thing

Yeah so, let me clear a few things up: I didn't mean to make anyone cry, and to the one reviewer who figured it out before I posted this, thank you for letting me know that it was indeed clarified in my writing what I was doing before I posted this. XD I love you, you know who you are. XD To the flamers out there who didn't like my last chapters: Sorry you didn't realize it. Also, this chapter is in italics because it's a memory. This event has already happened, k? K. Keep reading now. XD

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><p>.<p>

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_Gilbert sat in the office, half-listening to the teacher who was supposedly talking to him, half-thinking about more important and totally awesome things. Okay he wasn't even half-listening. And apparently the teacher was realizing this._

"_Gilbert, we are asking your permission to put you in a program called Mission for Change. It's to change your classmates' behavior towards teenage depression and suicide." The teacher sighed, repeating herself for the goodness-knows-what-time._

"_Ja, ja. I heard you already. What the heck do I do in the program? I got a long enough school record without adding absences to it." Gilbert shrugged._

"_Your absence from school would be marked as a leave of absence. For all appearances to your classmates, you will be deceased. Your mother will know you are alive." The teacher repeated herself once more._

"_Well at least you're sparing mutti the heart attack, but deceased? No way. Suicide is a completely unawesome way to die. Not going to happen." Gilbert shook his head._

"_You prefer to die a natural death?" She half-glared at him._

"_That sounded like a threat." Gilbert returned the glare, along with a smirk, "And no. Sadly that option has already been ruled out for me. However, I will opt to die early of the illness I'm already living with."_

"_Beg pardon?"_

_That face was worth it. "Ja, ja. I got the diagnosis almost a year ago now. No contact with birth father equals no chance of surgery. So, I'm dying. Only mutti knows I have another several months yet, so I can opt to die early without raising suspicion." Gilbert grinned. The look on this lady's face was hilarious._

"_I wouldn't know it by looking at you." The teacher commented._

"_Ja, I know. That's kind of the point." Gilbert stared at her in disbelief. Hello, duh. Anyone home?_

"_You act out to make people think you're healthy?" The teacher blinked. Nope. Not even a light on._

"_No. I act out to add some life to my life because it's going to be short." Gilbert said flatly, "So whatever, dying early, yada. What else am I doing for this thing?"_

"_You failed your emotional aptitu…"_

"_I already knew that." Gilbert cut her off, earning himself a glare._

"_So you will be attending an emotional therapy session during this time."_

"_Oh terrific. One of those classes where you get taught how to behave towards certain interactions?" Gilbert burst out laughing._

"_No…one of those classes where you learn how to be more open about your emotions." The teacher sighed heavily._

"_That's even worse." Gilbert winced, "Meh, oh well. Not like it's gonna do me any good anyhow. Sure whatever." Gilbert waved a hand carelessly._

"_Also need you to write a final letter to be read to your classmates at the assembly tomorrow." The teacher pushed over a blank sheet of notebook paper._

"_What the heck am I supposed to say? Have a good day, I'm dead?" Gilbert stared at her blankly._

"_Don't write that." The teacher slapped a hand to her forehead, "Write as though this is the last thing you have to communicate to your classmates."_

"_Yeah sure. Who's reading this?" Gilbert started scrawling on the paper._

"_The principal, why?"_

"_Hell yeah. This is gonna be fun!" Gilbert burst out laughing._

"…_.I shouldn't have told you that." The teacher sighed heavily, "Anyway, after you're done with that, you will be leaving school in an ambulance, more than likely covered with a white sheet in case any of the students see it."_

"_Sweet. Going to be riding in first class." Gilbert laughed again and handed her the letter._

"_Sit comfortable. The ambulance will be here in another hour or so." The teacher shook her head and quietly left the room._

"_Whatever. Works for me." Gilbert propped his legs up on the desk the teacher had been sitting at and let his mind wander once more._

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><p>So here it be! Thanks to those of you who kept reading even after the last chapter where you all thought I killed them off! 8D I think only one person read Gilbert's story and realized he couldn't be dead before I added this chapter up. This, I find hilarious. Review? ^_^<p> 


	7. Student Council and UNAWESOME CLASS

So here goes, the next chapter. I'd say more here but I'm falling asleep so on we go:

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Roderich sat by himself in the student council room, sitting with his head laying on the table in front of him. No motivation whatsoever. He really should be reviewing papers, but he didn't feel like it. At least when Arthur was in here, he had someone to talk to. Now…there was no one.

Roderich shook his head, well moping around would not get any work done. He pulled the envelope over and dumped the papers out on the table. First up…Roderich glanced over it. The words seemed to run together. Roderich sighed heavily and pulled out a cloth to clean his glasses with. This was going to be a long day.

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Gilbert scowled. These slides were so completely boring. Could they at least make them a little interesting? He noticed that Lovino in front of him kept shifting his position. Apparently he was trying to stay awake. Gilbert smirked. Antonio always did the same thing, but the Spaniard usually ended up losing to the battle and fell asleep anyway.

Gilbert let his gaze drift back to the slides. What was the point of this again? To teach them to cope with their emotions? What emotions exactly were they learning to cope with? If it was boredom, they were learning how to find ways to entertain themselves. Gilbert let his gaze wander around the room and saw Matthew, little blonde kid sitting next to him, now that he thought about it, did they ever even talk during school? Only reason he knew his name was because Alfred had mentioned it. Matthew seemed to be dozing off. His eyes were closed, how did he sleep sitting up like that?

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Roderich signed the paper he was currently reviewing and pushed it to the side. One down. And how many more to go? Roderich looked down at the number of papers. Too many. Maybe a walk around the hallway would help clear his mind. But then again, if a teacher saw him, he would be sent to guidance more than likely. That is something to avoid. Roderich stood up and pulled open a file drawer. Completely organized by file name. Roderich pulled open the second one and found the same thing. Apparently Arthur had organized all the files without him knowing. Well. That was nice of him. And…

"I can't even say thank you." Roderich slapped a hand to his forehead with a sigh. "Oh what a day this is turning out to be." He paced around the room several times. Those papers needed worked on. But he couldn't focus.

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Gilbert leaned forward. Time to mess with the little Italian. Otherwise they were both going to fall asleep.

"If you feel the familiar feeling of despair falling over you, don't be afraid to get help~" Gilbert grinned as the reaction was exactly what he wanted. Lovino did a better job of suppressing laughter than Antonio or Alfred did, that was for sure. He could still see his shoulders shaking though.

"Talk to a friend or a teacher that's nearby if you're in school~" Gilbert continued, causing Lovino to turn around. That was definitely a look of amusement. Success!

"You are having way too much fun with this." It was probably meant as a complaint, but the smile was a dead give away that he thought it was funny.

"Ja, of course~" Gilbert smiled cheerfully, "Don't have anything else to do." It was true. Boredom was clearly winning this battle.

"Try listening." Gilbert tilted his head in Arthur's direction when the student council person spoke. He knew the male had been sitting next to Lovino, but this was another person he had hardly ever spoken to.

"I am. Didn't you hear my awesome quote?" Gilbert smirked at Arthur. Might as well have some more fun~

"Obviously not. I was listening to the slide." Arthur sighed. Gilbert stared at him in disbelief. What seriously? He was actually paying attention to all of this?

"Yeah well, you let me know if you learn anything from this." Gilbert waved a hand carelessly, not bothering to say anything else. If Arthur wanted to listen to this annoying speaker, then he could benefit from the experience. If there was any benefit to be had.

Gilbert watched as the teacher stepped out into the hallway. Apparently she got called out. Oh well. More fun to be had without someone 'authoritative' being in the room. He perked up a bit as Lovino shifted in his seat to look at Matthew, "Are you listening to this?"

Gilbert glanced over in Matthew's direction. He was awake now at least. If he had been sleeping earlier.

"Eh? Not really." Matthew slumped across his desk, "How are we supposed to talk to people about what we're feeling? Are we going to get counselor buddies or something when we get back to school?"

Gilbert quickly covered his mouth with both hands, trying to suppress the laughter that was coming. Oh man! The thought of that was hilarious! He could just see the little hired counselors following them around all day! "If they give me a counselor buddy I will deck the guy over the head and stuff him in the closet." Gilbert smirked in response, once he was able to talk without bursting into fits of uncontrollable laughter.

Gilbert grinned. This was going to be AWESOME! He had three, even if one was insisting they pay attention, to tease if they were going to be stuck in this class much longer.

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Roderich tapped the completed papers and slid them neatly back into the envelope. All he had needed was the proper motivation. And being threatened by the principal to be dragged down to guidance had nothing to do with it. Roderich walked out of the room, locking the door behind him before heading to the office to deliver the envelope. At least now he could go to class and concentrate on something else besides the voice in the back of his head.

That voice was beginning to become really irritating. Especially when it was right.

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Okay, there we go! I'm seriously falling asleep here. I might end up just submitting two now and two tomorrow. X_x meh. Only problem with that is, I like submitting all the chapters together…ugh. Oh well, leave a review?


	8. Lunchtime

Okay. So after two days, I am going to try and keep this upbeat! :D And if you read the other stories before this one, you'll either be laughing or agreeing that it's more upbeat. Or thinking it was stupid. Either of the three. XD Moving on. Split chapter, k?

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><p>.<p>

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Roderich took his lunch tray over and sat down by himself at a corner table. Fortunately he had finished the paperwork just in time for lunch, so he was one of the first ones down there. Even better, he didn't have to stand in line. Now he could take his time eating…relaxation in a day of stress. Roderich sipped his hot tea. He was more than content to be sitting by himself…even if it did make him remember that Arthur would sit with him at lunch most days, unless Alfred begged him to help him study for a test that they had in the next class. On the rare occasion even, Alfred would come over and sit with _them_. Which always surprised both Arthur and himself, of course, usually Alfred would never turn down the opportunity to sit with his fellow athletes. Now…it was quiet.

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Gilbert looked at the walls of the room they were in while wandering to the table that Arthur sat at. He seemed to be doing the same thing. Honestly it looks like a… "Prison cafeteria." That was it. Gilbert sat down across from Arthur and looked at the Englishman blankly. That face was completely…emotionless. Well. This therapy session should be good for him.

"What?" Arthur asked.

"It looks like a freaking cafeteria that belongs in a prison." Gilbert said flatly, looking around again. "Seriously. Where's the color in here?"

"It is rather dull." Arthur responded softly. Dude. Speak up. Seriously. Show some energy, would you? "Then again, I suppose it's not that much different from ours, just minus all the colorful posters."

"Meh." Gilbert looked at the tray he had been given, "Think this is edible?" He tilted his head slightly. Maybe it was supposed to be some kind of pork…and the mashed potatoes just hadn't been mixed well. Yeah that was it. Gilbert cut off a piece of what it was probably safe to assume was pork.

He noticed Lovino sit down next to him and was about to take a bite when: "This is like hospital food right?" Lovino had sat down next to Gilbert, "Doesn't look or taste like what it's supposed to."

Gilbert froze about to eat the bite that was on his fork. That didn't sound appealing _at all._ And he was supposed to be going to a hospital for surgery? If his father ever could be found…oh wait. That's right. He was found. He was here the whole time! Oh the irony…

"Have you tried it yet?" Arthur was asking Lovino.

"No. Just a thought." Lovino commented, waving a hand in the air. Well might as well try it. Take one for the team.

Gilbert took the bite into his mouth cautiously and only had it in his mouth for maaaaybe two seconds before promptly spitting out in his napkin. He threw the napkin in the wastebasket behind Lovino and stabbed the pork-imposter with his fork. That'll show it.

"The gang's all here…" Arthur was commenting.

"Yeah. What part of the gang _is_ here." Gilbert grumbled. He missed Antonio. And Roderich. Man did he miss teasing Roddy.

Arthur looked over, "How was it?"

"How was what?" Gilbert asked, feigning a look of innocence. Let someone else eat that. _They_ can take one for the team. That was frickin' awful.

Judging by the reaction on Arthur's face…the mashed potatoes were probably not potatoes and could be easily assumed to have about the same taste as the awful pork, or whatever that was.

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Roderich took a small bite of his sandwich and continued watching as students mingled out of the line and to their tables with the lunchtrays. He still sat by himself. Nice and quiet. Or it _was._ To his surprise, and confusion, Cruz suddenly sat down across from him. Have we ever even spoken before? Roderich just looked at him with a blank expression.

"Didn't feel like sitting anywhere else." Cruz commented, beginning to eat his own lunch without saying anything else.

Well. Some company was better than no company. As long as it was silent and not obnoxiously loud. Roderich continued eating.

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"So how was it?" Gilbert smirked at Arthur. He couldn't resist.

"Gah…what was that?" Arthur was still making the absolutely hilarious facial expression, "And what is this?" He was referring to his drink. Though by the way he was examining the label, he was probably looking to see the ingredients in it. Some things were better left a mystery. Like that pork.

"Fruit juice?" Matthew suggested quietly.

"No." Lovino rejected the idea.

"No?" Arthur's gaze had turned to Lovino, so Gilbert looked at Lovino as well.

"Definitely not a fruit." Lovino was scowling. Then Gilbert noticed that he was about to eat the…pork. He quickly put a hand on Lovino's wrist to stop him.

"I wouldn't eat that if I were you." Gilbert said, quite calmly, before shifting his hand back to its original resting spot on the table.

Lovino just looked at him, "Why?"

"Just don't." Gilbert repeated. I am trying to help you here. Do not eat that.

"Class will not resume until all trays are empty!"

Gilbert gaped at the teacher in horror. You must be joking. If they ate this they would suffer from food poisoning!

"No way." Gilbert said flatly, glaring at the lunch tray.

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Roderich finished off his sandwich and started sipping his…warm, now, tea. Cruz hadn't said anything else, and was only concentrating on his lunch, which had vanished quite quickly. He ate fast. Not nearly as fast as Alfred. Roderich kept his comments to himself regarding the actual tasting of the food that was supposed to happen. If all rumors were true, then Cruz was not someone to annoy. Though just going by appearances, the rumors were true. He was rather intimidating.

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Gilbert looked up and noticed Arthur was gagging on his drink. And the tray was empty. Apparently he had learned from Alfred.

"How the hell did you just do that?" Gilbert glared at Arthur.

Arthur's response was to push the tray away, "Okay. I'm done. No more for me, thanks."

Gilbert looked over at Lovino and found he was just finishing off the drink as well, "You ate that, too?"

Lovino only smiled. Something was telling Gilbert that there was food in the trash can behind Lovino. Well. The Italian could suffer for it later. They probably weren't getting supper until six o'clock or so. Gilbert noticed Matthew was looking at the bottle of juice, to Arthur, to Lovino, and then back at the bottle again. Was there something on it? Gilbert picked up the bottle and read over the paragraph that was written on it. Oh. That was what he was doing. Gilbert started laughing as Arthur and Lovino left the room to go back to the class. "Oh this will make it much easier."

Matthew nodded in response, "I guess Arthur missed it while reading the ingredients…"

"Haha, sucks for him." Gilbert smirked. No wonder that pork tasted awful. Gilbert poured out the formerly-known-as-juice over the pork and potatoes. "Well then. I hope they know they just drank a bottle of gravy." Gilbert started eating the pork and potatoes, "Much more edible."

"I wonder why we didn't get a drink?" Matthew looked around in confusion.

"Maybe we get one back in the classroom. Like a bottle of water or something." Gilbert shrugged, still eating.

"Oh that could be."

Gilbert tossed his tray in the trashcan. Yup. There was the pork and potatoes from Lovino's tray. Surprise. Not. Gilbert smirked and tossed the empty bottle in the trash, "I think we're gonna keep this a secret from them. They can continue to suffer through their 'awful' food."

Matthew smiled at Gilbert, "Provides entertainment."

"Exactly!" Gilbert put his arm around Matthew, "And we need all the entertainment we can get!"

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><p>And in the end, Gilbert and Matthew have the last laugh. :) Leave me a review? :D<p> 


	9. Break time!

So…sorry about lack of updates the last three days. First day I was distracted by finding a manga I've been looking for. So of course I read it in its entirety. XD Yesterday I was feeling understimulated *not enough sleep*, and today (Friday), fanfiction wouldn't let me sign in. Kept saying the connection timed out. So. No clue when this update is going to come up.

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><p>.<p>

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Roderich moved his pencil across the notebook paper, dutifully writing notes that were written on the board. The class was rather quiet. Then again, he normally had this class with Gilbert. And now… Roderich looked at Gilbert's empty seat that was beside him. It was a little too quiet. He actually was starting to feel restlessness in the air. This class was accustomed to distractions. Now with the teacher going on with a lecture that was uninterrupted…it seemed…strange.

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Gilbert listened to the sounds of his roommates moving around. So far this so-called therapy camp was just fine. And entertaining. He rolled over on his side and smirked.

"Well. Apparently there is no class after lunch for us." Arthur spoke up, breaking the silence in the room. Well. Almost silence, there was some creaking from the bunk beds but oh well.

"Works for me. At least if we get sick from eating, it won't be in the middle of class." Lovino's voice came from below Gilbert. Well you and Arthur can get sick. The awesome me and Mattie will be just fine. Gilbert couldn't suppress the small grin that appeared on his face.

"How did the teachers approach you all?" Mattie's turn to speak up.

"A teacher practically dragged me off the roof and down to the office. Now that I think about it, he might have said the principal wanted to talk to me, but I was too busy protesting the whole way." Arthur grumbled. The student council person doesn't listen? What kind of a student council member is that?

"I was blackmailed." Lovino was rather frustrated, too, apparently, "Stupid teacher said he'd report the failed emotional test or whatever to my parents. And I would get sent here anyway."

Gilbert started laughing. Apparently he was the only one who wasn't blackmailed. Then again, he was the only one who didn't "die by suicide", "I was approached normally, sorry. Gets me out of that boring school so what the heck do I care? I'll die an early death, big deal." _Going to more than likely die one anyhow. Might as well fake one and have the real one later.  
><em>

"Eh…I was blackmailed too I suppose. If I didn't come they were going to report to my parents anyhow, so might as well come and save whatever dignity I had left." Matthew let out a sigh. Pft. Blackmail just made it all the more fun~

"Dignity? That sounds like something that will be non-existent the instant we go back into school." Lovino scoffed. Okay, he had a point. They were most certainly not going to have any shred of dignity left.

"How are they planning on doing that?" Arthur looked thoughtful on the matter.

"Dunno. We just show up and go TA-DA." Gilbert laughed at the thought of it, "Oh man, can you see their faces~!" Gilbert continued laughing.

Apparently Arthur could, because he winced quite visibly, "Yeah…Alfred will probably strangle Matthew, if Cruz doesn't first, and if Cruz does, then he's going to strangle me."

"Ehhhhhh~!" Matthew was whimpering at that. Not that Gilbert blamed him.

"…Uh…I'm not really sure how Antonio would react. Or Feli." Movement indicated Lovino was peering up at him, "What about you?"

Gilbert peered over the side of the bed and smirked at Lovino, "Hmmm…Antonio would probably hit us both over the head, scream something about us scaring the heck out of him, and then we would probably both get a hug hard enough to choke any remaining air out of our lungs."

"And my stupid brother will be pitching a fit." Lovino was grumbling. Oh yes. Feliciano would _definitely_ be pitching a fit.

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><p>Sorry for the short chapter! Cannot focus x_x<p> 


	10. Planning and Naptime

Sorry for the lack of updates the last couple days! I was distracted by a computer game I got an expansion pack for, but I am back. *for a little while* xD By the way, I suck at writing Roderich, I know it already, so ignore his ooc-ness please. =_= I love the pairing, but I like reading it more than writing it, I just cannot get his character right. I'd watch hetalia episodes with him in it, but there's a sleeping two-year-old in the room, so that wouldn't work. If this chapter comes out more Gilbert than Roderich, now you know why.

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><p>.<p>

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Gilbert leaned up against the wall at the back of the room. To say the class was small would be an understatement. There were three other people besides him in the room, and one of them was the teacher. Why couldn't they have just joined up with another class, seriously.

The teacher also sat on the floor, looking at the two students that sat on the floor around him. He leaned over a little to see that Gilbert was sitting way back against the wall. "You can come up here and join us."

"No." Gilbert said flatly, "I'm fine right where I'm at."

Okay. That was a first. He'd never seen a teacher pout before. It was actually pretty hilarious. Clearly the guy had some issues of his own.

"Fine, we'll move back there." The teacher stood up and motioned to the other to go to the back of the room where Gilbert was.

Gilbert rolled his eyes, "Clearly there aren't any teacher's notes that are passed on with the students."

"Your teachers think you're gone from this world. There's only a couple that don't know." The teacher-counselor-whatever-the-heck-this-guy-is commented with a smile.

"You mean dead." Gilbert said flatly, "Just say it. Seriously. And I don't care if there are only a couple who know, the couple teachers who do know, I guarantee you, know me quite well."

"I take it you have a record at school?" He looked amused more than anything else. The other two students were just staring at Gilbert in shock.

"Maybe." Gilbert smirked, "Only for class disruptions and getting into the occasional fight with some prejudiced moron."

"…well sounds like whoever it was had it coming." He still looked slightly amused.

"How do you say dead so easily?" Okay the brunette kid has issues too apparently.

"How can you not?" Gilbert just looked at him, "Dead is dead, you don't have to sugarcoat it."

"But dead is like gone forever!" Great. Blondie has issues too. This was going to be a loooong class.

"No crap, dead is gone forever. It's not like we have a bunch of zombies walking around." Gilbert glared at the blonde.

"That would be creepy." The counselor commented. Clearly he was failing as a teacher, so he must be a counselor.

"I knew that!" The blonde pouted. Was this the room for the pouters? Because the awesome me most certainly does NOT pout. "But how can you just talk about someone dying so easily? You're never gonna see them again if they're gone!"

Gilbert just stared at him with an are-you-stupid-look on his face, "Well unless you're a psychic, obviously you can't talk to the dead. That goes right along with, they're gone forever."

"I think the point is here, that you talk about being dead as if it's not that big of a deal." The counselor spoke up.

"Because it's not. If the person is dead, it means they're not here. They're somewhere else, somewhere probably much better than this craphole." Gilbert commented.

"…craphole…" Now the counselor was speechless. Clearly counselor didn't fit this guy either.

"But don't you miss the person at all?" Brunette kid finally speaks!

"I don't know. I don't have anyone I know who's dead." Gilbert glared at the brunette.

"Your grandparents are still alive?" Was that this kid's problem?

"I don't know them." Gilbert continued glaring.

"Whaaaaaat? Not your mom's or your dad's?" Hm. He regained his ability to speak.

"Hey dumbass. Just so you know, I live with my mother. I've seen my father once in my life that I remember." Gilbert glared at the idiot-who-was-supposed-to-be-helping.

Well now apparently he can't talk at all. Awesome me made three people speechless~!

Gilbert smirked slightly. The silence was hilarious.

"So you never spoke to your dad at all?" Oh the blonde was brave.

"Obviously not, or I would have said that. I've seen him once. And he doesn't even know who I am. It's not like I went up to him and introduced myself." Gilbert glared at the blonde.

"Did he and your mother not get along?" Idiot-who-was-supposed-to-be-helping recovers fast. Faster than the brunette idiot anyway.

"How the heck should I know? It's not like we talk about it! There's nothing to talk about if he's not there with us now, is there?" Gilbert snapped at him.

Silence once again. It'd be quite amusing to be able to read their thoughts right now.

"Man if I had never met my dad I'd be asking about him." The brunette spoke up.

"Oh sure you would." Gilbert looked at him. Now this is just annoying. "People who say crap like that, put themselves in the actual person's position, and their reaction would be exactly the same."

"Name one good reason you have that you don't make an attempt to talk to your father." The idiot-who-was-supposed-to-be-helping stared at Gilbert as if he was attempting to read his mind.

Gilbert remained silent for a moment before smiling a _very_ cold smile, "Because somehow starting off a conversation with: 'Hi, you don't know me, but I'm the one son your wife left with, and by the way, I'm going to die in two months or so because you weren't around to give me the transfusion I needed.' Doesn't seem like it would go over well, does it?"

Oh their faces were absolutely hilarious! They were so pale they looked like actual ghosts!

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Roderich sat at home by himself. His parents were out working, as they usually were. So he sat alone in the living room, staring at homework he knew he should be working on. The school day had seemed so long. Perhaps he should just turn in early for the night. After his homework was done.

He picked up his pen that had been laying on the table and was about to write when he slammed the pen down on the table with much more force than he knew was necessary. Forget the homework. His grades wouldn't drop to failing for not completing one assignment! Roderich threw everything in his backpack and stalked up the stairs. Tomorrow he would make sure the day passed by a little more eventfully. He just had to get some ideas. Maybe he could convince Alfred to help him out. They had two classes together.

Roderich sat on his bed, arms crossed, and a thoughtful expression on his face. What should he do? There had to be some way to make class more interesting. Gilbert would probably have tons of ideas. But it's not like he could ever answer his phone even if Roderich did get up the nerve to send him a message. Ghosts don't text. Roderich slumped back on his pillow with a sigh. He really should have allowed himself to have a little more fun when Gilbert was still around. Now he was going to have to do it by himself. And probably going to make an absolutely fool of himself. Oh well.

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They're still not talking. They're still staring. Gilbert was rather amused by this point. He shook his head slightly and leaned his head back against the wall, "I'm taking a nap. Let me know when you all feel like not being stuck on stupid anymore and actually talking."

Gilbert closed his eyes. They still didn't say anything. Naptime then.

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><p>This was definitely more Gilbert than Roderich. = w = by the way, it is evening here. It's kind of hard to tell with the way I'm writing isn't it? Sorry. Leave me a review? There will be more Roderich in next chapter~ , and much more ooc Roderich. Sorry. =_=<p> 


	11. Suppertime! STOP ASKING ME

Okay, so I was a little wrong about the Roderich ooc-ness, it's gonna be in next chapter. Otherwise this was going to be LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG. Continuing on~

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><p>.<p>

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Gilbert raised both eyebrows, no one had moved yet. How long had they been sitting there, honestly. "You know…it's kind of boring just sitting here." He stretched his arms above his head.

"S-sorry it's just…that was…" The idiot-who-was-supposed-to-be-helping just stared at him.

"So apparently you know absolutely nothing about your students or whatever we are?" Gilbert asked, rolling his eyes a bit.

"Well I know you three have health problems and that's why you're in here…I just didn't know it was…"

Gilbert smirked. Insert your foot into your mouth dumbass. I dare you.

He must have gotten the hint from the smirk because he didn't finish the sentence. What a pity.

"I just fall asleep all the time." The blonde blinked, "I don't have problems with anything else…is that a health issue?"

"I can't participate in sports…" The brunette sighed.

"Sports are fun." Gilbert commented, for no reason at all. He just felt like inserting a random comment.

"Right and because you three have health issues, it's thought that's why you three have a depressed outlook on life!" The idiot-who-was-supposed-to-be-helping must have decided he liked the taste of his foot.

"Who the hell are you calling depressed?" Gilbert glared at him.

More silence~ Yay~ it was so much more peaceful.

"I am not depressed. And don't say I am." Gilbert said flatly.

"Technically he said depressed outlook…" The brunette whispered quietly.

"It means the same damn thing. Depressed outlook on life means you're depressed, period. Which I am not. I have absolutely no issues whatsoever with my moods, thank you very much." Gilbert glared at the student who sat to his left.

"W-well then, we'll just continue hopefully on a brighter note tomorrow~" The stupid-counselor stood up and clapped his hands together, "I don't want to hold you three up from supper!"

"Oh joys." Gilbert stood up and stretched out his legs a bit, "Food time." He wandered out of the class, ignoring the looks he got from the other three. Idiots.

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Roderich looked at what he had written down on paper and smiled. This would do perfectly. He would make sure that he was not bored in class tomorrow. Even if he was going to spend it down in the office for sure. Roderich nodded and placed the paper next to his outfit he had laid out for the next day and curled up on his bed.

Plenty of sleep will help. Roderich closed his eyes and…his thoughts just _had_ to go to Gilbert. He rolled over and grabbed his phone without thinking and fired off an angry text message before remembering that Gilbert obviously was _not_ going to answer that. Roderich shook his head and burrowed under the covers. He had just sent a message to a dead person's phone. Well if that didn't make him crazy, he didn't know what did.

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Gilbert blinked as he felt his phone buzzing. Mutti? He took out his phone and opened the text message, only to find it was from Roderich. Why was this guy texting a supposed dead person's phone?

_**Why is it I can't even sleep without being interrupted by you, seriously!**_

How was he even supposed to respond to that? Oh wait, that's right, he's not. Gilbert shoved the phone back into his pocket and sulked. Well that was no fun. Then again…a small idea popped into the back of his head. You see it on tv all the time that ghosts like electronics right? Gilbert smirked and sent a quick text message back before going into the lunchroom. Roderich was probably fast asleep and wouldn't get the text until morning anyhow.

Gilbert looked around the lunchroom but didn't see the other three at all. Maybe they weren't here yet? He shrugged and grabbed a tray that he was handed before turning back out to the group, and discovered Matthew was waving to him from a corner of the room. Gilbert grinned and waved back, before happily making his way back to the corner.

"Yo, Mattie~!" Gilbert sat down next to him, still grinning. He glanced down at the tray in front of him and made a face, "What is this supposed to be?" Yeah it looked more edible than lunch, but still. If that was a burger, they needed to fry it a bit more. Wasn't even the right color.

"Burger. And some kind of soup. Haven't tried it yet. The burger isn't half bad if you drown it in ketchup and mustard." Matthew answered with a smile, "How was your last class?"

Gilbert burst out laughing while he picked up a couple of the packets of ketchup that were on his tray. No way was he using that mustard. "Oh man that was great. I totally made them speechless." Gilbert began dumping the ketchup on the burger.

"Eh? What happened?" He was watching Gilbert while the burger was in process of being fixed up to his taste buds liking…well…sort of. At least it would be more edible.

"Somehow we got on the subject of my family, no clue how that happened, but whatever, so I told them I only lived with mein mutti, my mother, sorry." Gilbert shrugged, correcting his German, "So they were asking about my dad if I had ever met him…crap like that." First languages are so hard not to use when you're used to speaking it at home all the time.

"Have you?" Matthew asked, tilting his head slightly. Well that was a cute expression. Roddy's angry face was cuter though. Gilbert almost chuckled at the thought.

"Technically. I saw him, didn't introduce myself. Anyway, told the stupid idiot, teacher, exactly what I just told you and that starting a conversation with: 'I'm your dying son' somehow didn't appeal to me. Abbreviated that a bit." Gilbert added, stirring his soup. No need to say word for word what was said, right?

Wrong. Matthew just about choked on whatever he was eating. Gilbert raised both eyebrows and hit him on the back, "Dude, breathe!" Gilbert burst out laughing again. How can you choke on the burger? Chew first, then swallow. Not that hard.

"Dying?" Matthew repeated, staring at Gilbert.

"Isn't that what I said?" Gilbert raised both eyebrows and returned the stare. Hello? Earth to blondie.

"Well yeah it's just…I wouldn't know it from your personality…you're…hyper." Matthew blushed a bit. Hyper. Loud fits…noisy fits…energetic fits…but…hyper?

"Hyper makes me sound like a schoolgirl who's crushing on someone." Gilbert scoffed, taking a sip of the soup. He just about gagged and quickly put his spoon down. "Oh mein gott, don't eat that." He pointed to the soup, "Just don't." Gilbert shook his head again and frowned at the burger, "You sure this is safe?"

"Tastes fine to me." Matthew took commented, "Ehm…pardon if this is sensitive, what are you dying of?" He was choking again. This was on purpose wasn't it?

"Dude. Chew first. Then swallow." Gilbert started hitting him on the back again, "I'm starting to think you're doing that on purpose. And it's not sensitive. I don't even remember the name or whatever they said. All I know is, the only way I would ever have a chance of surviving is if my birth-dad was able to give me a transfusion. And considering I haven't seen him, except for once, that is so not happening." Gilbert took a small bite of the burger. "Meh. Not that bad."

"When did you last see him?" Matthew began eating his soup instead. Hm. No denial to the choking on purpose. Interesting.

"Hmmm…two days ago?" Gilbert thought about it, "I think." He glanced around the cafeteria, curiously, "Where's Arthur and Lovi?"

"Two days? Why didn't you just…never mind. You already said why." Matthew sighed again. He sighs a lot.

"Ja." Gilbert smirked, "If I die, then so be it. Dead is dead." This is sounding like the last class I was just in.

"Technically we are dead." Matthew said flatly. Okay, good point.

"Well yeah. But dead for real." Gilbert sighed, "Besides, why would Vati help a son he hasn't seen for like 16 years?" Not about to admit that's what had crossed his mind all along.

"Isn't that sort of what…dads are supposed to do?" Matthew looked at him blankly.

"I wouldn't know." Gilbert returned the stare. How the heck am I supposed to know? I just saw mine for the first time in like 16 years! To my memory.

"Yeah well, neither would I. I don't talk to mine all that much even though we live in the same house." Matthew got the idea to dunk his burger in the soup and took a bite, "Eh, that helped."

"Did it?" Gilbert dunked his burger as well, "Oh, there's Arthur." He waved his hand around to catch the Englishman's attention, before taking a bite of his burger.

"I wonder what Cruz is doing." Matthew glanced at his watch, "Probably sleeping." That would be a good assumption.

"No kidding. Talk about a late supper, geez." Gilbert grumbled as Arthur sat down across from him.

"Well." Arthur shook his head before looking at the tray, "Burger and soup? If you can call it that." Gilbert could've burst out laughing again as Arthur lifted the top bun and raised an eyebrow.

"Alfred wouldn't approve of it at all." Matthew laughed.

"No he wouldn't. He'd be standing up there raising a fit." Arthur sighed before dropping the bun back on top, "Lovino's coming." Assuming there means the line, I can see that. Gilbert shook his head and took a sip of the supposed-mixed-fruit-drink. Bleah.

"Oh, were you two in the same class?" Matthew blinked in surprise.

"Yes." Arthur looked at him in confusion, "Weren't you two?"

"Nope. I was in a class of four, including the idiot teacher." Gilbert took a bite of his burger. He was being looked at again.

Matthew looked at Gilbert for a moment, "Eh. I was in a normal-sized class."

"What, was my class the only small one? Geeeez." Gilbert shrugged it off. Well the teacher did say it was for those with health problems, so that would make sense.

Matthew looked up as Lovino sat down across from him, "Hello."

"Hi." Lovino glared at the burger, "Can't they serve pasta, or something." He dumped the ketchup on top of the burger with a sigh. Of course the Italian would want pasta. Just like he was German and would have preferred sausage and _real_ potatoes. Not that potato-substitute they had at lunch. That didn't count.

"You want my ketchup?" Arthur asked of Lovino. Clearly this guy's taste buds were not picky.

"I swear you're trying it on purpose." Gilbert commented, smirking slightly at Matthew. He ate that so fast, thought for sure he was going to choke again.

Matthew glared at him, "I am not. Shut up." WHOA. He _can_ get mad!

Arthur and Lovino both stared at the two.

"Trying what?" Arthur tilted his head. He looked confused, well yeah, he wasn't around for the conversation before.

"Nothing." Matthew spoke up before Gilbert could. Not that it mattered because his leg received a sharp pain all of a sudden.

"Ow!" Gilbert winced and rubbed his leg, "That hurt!" He looked at Matthew with an injured expression.

Matthew only glared at him. He finished the entire meal already. Geez. He must have been hungry.

"Well. This must be more edible than lunch if you're done already." Arthur commented before taking a bite of his plain burger. Yeah. No taste buds.

Gilbert exchanged glances with Matthew. But the albino made no comment and instead finished off his own sandwich and began stirring the soup again. He gulped it down, which was good, because the next question would have made him dump it on the blonde who was sitting next to him.

"Are you related to Ludwig?" Matthew looked at Gilbert. WE DON'T LOOK ALIKE. WE ARE NOTHING ALIKE.

Gilbert just stared at Matthew, "He's not my brother if that's what you're asking." Not my brother. Not a lie. Only family I have is mom. May be related by blood, but not brothers.

"You both speak German though, I'm amazed you're not friends." Lovino spoke up in comment. Seriously. Just because we speak a common language?

"Ja…no way. He's a stiff. He needs to have a little more fun." Gilbert waved a hand around carelessly. So not going to have this conversation.

Gilbert's eyes narrowed as Matthew suddenly seemed lost in thought. So far, that did not bode well. Might as well stop the train of thought process. Gilbert raised his hand and smacked Matthew on the back of the head.

"Ow!" Matthew winced, rubbing the back of his head, "What was that for?" His turn for the hurt expression. Meh.

"You know what it was for." Gilbert said flatly, finishing his drink. "Going back to our wonderful bedroom, see you two back there." Gilbert waved at Arthur and Lovino, with a grin, before forcibly dragging Matthew out of the room.

"What? What did I say?" Matthew protested, leaving behind a much bewildered Arthur and Lovino.

"Just shut up." Gilbert said through gritted teeth, "I am not sitting there while you go off on one of your trains of thought that always seem to get you to ask a question that is really uncomfortable to answer."

"Eh? Uncomfortable?" Matthew asked, managing to keep up with his longer strides.

"Ja. How would you feel if you were in my position, constantly being asked about a family that you have no clue about? The only family member I have is my mother." Gilbert glared at Matthew before stalking into their room.

"Ehhh…sorry."

The apology was so damn quiet, Gilbert almost didn't hear it. He just shook his head and swung himself up onto the top part of the bunk-bed he shared with Lovino, "Whatever. Just don't bring up the subject." He laid down and closed his eyes, listening to the shifts of the mattress that indicated Matthew was climbing onto it.

"How are we supposed to sleep on such a lumpy mattress?" Matthew squeaked in quiet protest.

Gilbert smirked, "Close your eyes, and count sheep. Or think of a tall, dark…Cuban." Gilbert looked over to see what the blonde's response would be.

Well if looks could kill! GEEZ.

"Shut. Up." Matthew hissed.

"You asked. I was trying to help." Gilbert rolled over onto his stomach and smirked at Matthew, "And you know, if looks could kill you could've spared me like two months. Thanks." Gilbert grinned.

Hm. Forgot I didn't mention that. Matthew was so white now, he almost resembled a ghost. Ironic.

"Two months?" Matthew asked.

"Isn't that what I said?" Gilbert raised both eyebrows again.

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><p>Yeah so Gilbert doesn't really think about other people's reactions before talking in this chapter. Oh well. Leave me a review~<p> 


	12. Roderich is having fun!

Not much to say here, other than: Thanks for all the wonderful reviews I've been getting~ :D I love all my reviewers, and to the unsigned reviews who keep asking questions: one of these times I will remember to answer them before I submit the chapter. =_=; Signed reviews are easier to answer questions, all I have to do is hit compose reply, but I actually gotta remember I have unanswered questions in my inbox that I gotta answer for the unsigned ones, so sorry about that. Anyway, moving on. XD

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Gilbert tossed and turned most of the night. How could anyone sleep on this stupid lumpy mattress? Every time he sat up though, the other three were sound asleep. Great. Maybe it's just him. Gilbert sighed and laid back down again. He stared at the ceiling and scowled. This really was not a good day or night. Well the day had started out awesome, but ended not so awesome. Stupid class just _had_ to bring up family, didn't it?

Still…maybe talking about it with someone would help. Gilbert shook his head and rolled over again, facing the wall once more. He was going to sleep the rest of the night if he had to smother himself with his pillow to the point of passing out, damn it.

Except…one little problem that came blaring across the speaker system that Gilbert hadn't even realized was there until now.

"_RISE AND SHINE! IT'S TIME TO GET UP FOR YOUR MORNING BREAKFAST AND CLASSES!"_

"You have got to be fucking kidding me!" Gilbert yelled, "It's four o'clock in the morning!"

"_RISE AND SHINE!"_ *CLICK*

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Gilbert was going to sleep through the whole damn day. Gilbert laid back down on his bed and let out a groan. "Damn it…this is gonna SUCK." That wake-up call was just a nightmare right? He could go back to sleep? Apparently not. Arthur was slowly starting to stir.

"Is it morning already?" Arthur asked, rubbing his eyes sleepily.

"Nein. Four o'clock hardly counts as morning." Gilbert grumbled. He shook his head to try and clear the fog out while Arthur attempted to get Matthew out of bed. He leaned over the side of the bed and looked down at Lovino, "You getting up?"

"No." Lovino grumbled, "This is a bad dream and it's not time to get up yet."

"I'm all for that." Gilbert raised his hand slightly. Judging by the look Arthur was giving him, Matthew had said something along the same lines. Gilbert gave Arthur a lopsided grin.

Arthur sighed in response, "You know if we all don't get up and moving they're probably going to come in here and force us up."

"I'm up." Lovino suddenly sat up straight in bed.

Gilbert sighed heavily. "Fine." He glanced over and saw Arthur was still having no luck with Matthew, "He clearly is not a morning person. And neither am I." Gilbert attempted to stifle a yawn, but to no avail and stretched his arms out in front of him.

"You're awake though." Lovino glared at him as he climbed off the bed below Gilbert.

"Yeah. And I've also _been_ awake." Gilbert returned the glare. "I couldn't sleep." Gilbert climbed down the ladder and stretched one arm above his head. "I'm gonna fall asleep during class."

"Are you wearing what you wore to bed?" Lovino asked, looking over at the dresser that held their clothes.

"Might as well." Gilbert shrugged. He glanced over his shoulder to see Arthur motioning for them to leave.

"We'll catch up with you two!" Arthur commented.

"See you later then." Gilbert walked out of the room. He walked down the hallway with Lovino, towards the cafeteria, "How did you sleep then?" He ran a hand through his silver hair, attempting to straighten it out a bit.

"I didn't." Lovino grumbled, not even bothering to fix his own hair.

Lovino smiled, seriously that smile was creepy! "You know how hard it is to sleep when the bed keeps moving because _somebody_ can't stay in one spot?" Oh that's why.

Gilbert felt his face grow hot in embarrassment, "Well excuse me for not being able to get comfortable!" That mattress was _so_ not comfortable!

"I know the feeling." Lovino glared at him and stalked into the cafeteria.

Well _somebody_ woke up on the wrong side of the bed. Gilbert followed along behind him.

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Roderich opened his eyes when his alarm started going off. Time to get up and start getting ready for school. He forced himself out of bed and carried everything he had set out last night down the stairs. This was going to be a day that was different from yesterday. He was going to make absolutely sure that no one was gloomy.

Gilbert would be laughing his head off right now if he heard what Roderich was up to. Roderich shook his head and put everything into his backpack before going back up the stairs. This was going to be a strange feeling, not having the albino constantly teasing him anymore. He looked at his phone that was sitting on his stand and picked it up with a sigh.

"One new message?" Roderich raised both eyebrows at the screen. "But who would text me?" He opened the message and stared at it, "W-what is this?"

_**Roddy misses me? Kya~ yay! Don't worry about me, okay? We're having fun over here, and that principal better have read my letter! Otherwise I'm going to hit him over the head the next time I see him! Oh yeah, lighten up and have some fun every once in a while! Life is way too short to be such a stiff all the time!**_

Roderich stared at the message, about ready to toss it across the room. Did…he just get a response from a ghost? Roderich tilted his head slightly before shrugging and sending a response. Whether or not he got a response from that, was entirely up to Gilbert, but if he could read it, he was at least going to let Gilbert know that he would be just fine.

Roderich smiled and got changed for school. This would be a good day. He could feel it already.

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Gilbert sat at the table glaring at the breakfast tray. Some kind of egg substitute, obviously never came from an actual bird at any point in its lifetime, looked like…sausage! Gilbert quickly munched on the sausage, well fortunately they hadn't messed up that at all.

Gilbert tilted his head when his phone started going off and pulled it out. He grinned as he read the message.

_**I can handle myself just fine without you here. And for your information, I intend to have fun today. And yes the principal read your letter.**_

"Did your mother text you?" Lovino asked.

"Ja. Totally mutti." Gilbert lied. He put the phone back in his pocket without typing a response. He half-wondered what Roderich would be doing at school that he was calling fun. He rarely heard him use that word. He took the phone back out and typed in a response before pocketing it once more. He was curious.

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Roderich moved around the kitchen and blinked as he felt his phone going off again. Do ghosts really text a response? Roderich pulled out the phone and looked at the message.

_**My kind of fun or your kind of fun?**_ _**Because yours hardly counts as fun.**_

How rude! Roderich shook his head but returned an answer nonetheless. This was something else he would never tell anyone. Here he was, at almost five in the morning, texting a ghost. Roderich sighed heavily, but started making breakfast for himself. His parents were at an overnight meeting, so no need to worry about waking them up at least.

.

.

Gilbert poked the egg-substitute with his fork. "Think this is safe?"

"They taste fine to me. Was the sausage safe?" Lovino asked.

"Ja. And really good." Gilbert smiled cheerfully. Amazing how one text message from Roddy could cheer him up in two seconds~!

Except now he was getting a weird look from Lovino. Probably about the sudden mood change. Oh well. He could continue guessing. Gilbert took out his phone as it went off again and looked at the message.

_**Your kind of fun. To tell you the truth, there are a lot of people who are really upset after the other day's events, so I'm going to attempt to make some people smile. Even if I end up in the office because of this.**_

Gilbert's eyes widened. WHOA. Roddy was actually going all-out on this! And he had to miss it! Gilbert pouted at the phone. Maybe he could get some pictures. But somehow a ghost asking for pictures didn't seem right. Gilbert sighed heavily.

"What's up?" Arthur sat down next to Lovino.

"Oh apparently some people in school are really upset." Gilbert commented, typing in a message again, "Mutti is texting me." Roderich would never forgive him for being called his mother, oh well~

"Really?" Arthur blinked, "That's surprising. The way they all were laughing, I thought they still would be."

Lovino's face was suddenly turning red. He started stabbing at the sausage, but didn't say anything.

"Is something wrong?" Matthew sat next to Gilbert, looking at Lovino in confusion.

"No." Lovino shook his head hastily.

Gilbert pocketed his phone and hummed cheerfully, "Hey by the way, before you destroy the sausage, if you don't want it, gimme." He held up his fork hopefully.

Lovino glared at him but offered the sausage over anyway.

"Is that a German thing? You like sausage?" Matthew asked, staring at Gilbert.

Gilbert half-stared, half-glared right back, "As you put it, 'Germans' tend to call it wurst. And there is a slight difference, just so you know, I just happen to like sausage." Gilbert smiled.

Matthew must have gotten the hint not to bring up the subject of being German again, because he went back to eating.

.

.

_**I want pictures. *pout***_

Roderich stared at the phone. How did he send pictures to a ghost? He shook his head and typed in a response, huffing. Putting the phone away, Roderich started eating, but he could feel himself smiling. How did a text from a ghost cheer him up so fast?

Better start heading for school to get ready anyhow. Roderich hastily finished his food, tossing the dishes in the sink as he grabbed his backpack on the way by. Okay, now Gilbert really would be laughing his head off. Roderich was actually rushing.

Roderich shook his head and hurried off to school, today was going to be worth it! He would make sure of it!

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.

Gilbert looked at the paper he was given that said what room numbers he was in. Looks like…room 13 this morning. OH THAT WAS HELPING. Gilbert glared at the paper. He didn't get much sleep and now he was in an unlucky number room.

"_Gilbert Beilschmidt, please report to conference room A." *click*_

Gilbert looked up at the ceiling where the voice had come from. Well fine. But where was that at? Gilbert looked around in frustration. Was he just supposed to magically become a mind-reader?

Arthur, who had been right behind him, looked at Gilbert with raised eyebrows, "Conference room A?"

"Where the heck is that?" Gilbert grumbled.

"Good question." Arthur looked up and down the hallway, "Well there's someone you can probably ask." He pointed to one of the cafeteria monitors who had stepped out.

"Ja, ja. Fine." Gilbert stalked over to her, "Yo. Where's conference room A?"

"Oh! You must be Gilbert then." Well obviously. Why else would he be asking? "I can take you down there." You think I can't get there on my own?

Gilbert followed along behind her, glaring at the back of her head. This feels like elementary school! I have to have someone with me at all times~

"Here we are." She motioned to a closed door.

"Gee thanks." Gilbert put his hand on the handle but stopped and looked at her, "What is this about?"

"I honestly have no idea." The monitor shrugged, "Someone just requested to see you."

"Who would request to see me?" Gilbert pushed open the door in frustration. Seriously. The only one who knew he was still alive was his mother!

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.

Roderich snuck around the classroom, finishing up what he had rigged. Perfect! Roderich smiled and quickly left the room. This was going to be fun! Roderich smiled and walked to his locker, watching as other students started coming in. He leaned against his locker and watched for Alfred. He was at least going to warn the blonde about the upcoming class. It didn't take long to spot him.

"Hey Alfred. Come over here a sec." Roderich motioned to him.

Alfred tilted his head but came over, Antonio following along behind. What…happened to his hand?

"What's up?" Alfred smiled.

Roderich raised an eyebrow at Alfred's hand but shook his head, "Just a warning, class isn't going to go as normally planned." He smiled in return.

Antonio and Alfred both looked at him blankly.

"Is there another assembly or something?" Alfred blinked.

"No. I just decided to take a page from Gilbert's book on living." Roderich tilted his head slightly, still smilling.

"Oh sweet! This is gonna be awesome!" Alfred caught on and laughed.

Antonio looked back and forth between the two, "You're actually gonna disrupt class?" Antonio looked at Roderich amazed.

"I am." Roderich smiled, "Everything is set up already."

"This is gonna be sweet!" Alfred grinned.

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"You have got to be kidding me." Gilbert just glared at the male who was sitting in the conference room.

"What?" The adult version of Ludwig looked at him blankly. Apparently he hadn't seen him in the hallway the other day.

"What are you doing here?" Gilbert glared at him.

"I got a call from your mom."

"Of course you did." Gilbert rolled his eyes, and leaned against the closed door. Of course he hadn't left the doorway. That was a quick getaway if need be. Terrific. Stuck in an emotional counseling place, missing out on Roddy's first time ever having fun, and now _this guy._

"Gilbert…"

And here we go. Long conversation time.

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Roderich sat in his seat, smiling slightly. It was almost time. He had set up the trigger on a timer. When that clock hits 7:30, this class is going to be over. And so was his school record of good behavior. But, just for Gilbert, he had hidden a movie camera in the corner of the room by the door. No clue why he had even done that, but maybe they could use it for a flashback moment at the end of the year.

He could see Alfred in his seat three desks in front of him. Alfred looked excited for this. Antonio was sitting in what used to be Gilbert's seat beside him. The teacher had assigned Antonio to be Alfred's 'buddy' since he had…somehow broken his hand.

Roderich watched the clock. Thirty seconds. This was going to be so much fun! He leaned over slightly, preparing to hit the floor once the timer would hit.

"Okay class…" The teacher started. The bell rang a moment later, and so did the water balloons.

Roderich instantly ducked as they flew through the air, no longer held back in their hiding spots.

"WHOA!" Alfred yelped, ducking as one exploded just above his head, "Ahahahaha! This is freaking awesome!"

Roderich looked around and burst out laughing at the scene in front of him. The teacher was gaping at the classroom, which was now covered in water and pieces of balloon everywhere. His classmates all just sat in their seats, most jaws dropped in surprise and shock.

"WHO. DID THIS?" The teacher yelped.

Alfred clutched at his ribs and continued laughing, "Oh man!"

Antonio was laughing along with, "That was so funny!"

3…2…1… Roderich watched as the clock hit 7:35 and the second onslaught of water balloons flew…just as the principal walked in. Oops.

"Well. I see Gilbert's legacy still lives." The principal commented after getting hit by a red water balloon.

Roderich knew he should have been worried, but he couldn't stop laughing.

"Oh my word." The teacher looked around, "I know he didn't set this up, who the heck was it?" She looked around the room, as if expecting to get an answer.

Alfred turned in his seat to look back at Roderich, his eyes were sparkling, hoping there was something else coming.

Roderich smiled, "Three…two…one." He laughed again as the clock hit 7:40 and water balloons rained down from the ceiling decorations.

"RODERICH! THIS BETTER NOT HAVE BEEN YOU!" The principal yelled, his face red.

"Ahahahahaha!" Alfred continued laughing.

"Guilty." Roderich raised his hand, laughing.

"Oh my word! Gilbert would be on the floor laughing so hard right now!" Antonio burst out laughing again.

Roderich offered an apologetic smile to the principal and the teacher, but certainly didn't look like he meant it while he was laughing.

"Why would you do this?" The teacher gaped around the soaked classroom.

Roderich stood up and smiled, "I quote: There are some unawesome teachers around here who don't know how to laugh a little."

Alfred started clapping, despite his broken hand, "Encore~"

"NO!" The principal yelled.

"Encore!" Antonio joined in clapping.

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Gilbert sat in front of the door now, just glaring at the other male who was in the room. "You know, I didn't ask for the whole backstory, I really didn't care. You were looking for us this whole time, weren't you?"

"You knew that?" His father tilted his head, surprised.

"Ja. I saw you at school the other day." Gilbert smirked, "You were talking to Ludwig."

"Then why didn't you say anything? If you knew who we were."

"Why would I do that?" Gilbert laughed, "This is my life, isn't it? Can't I live it the way I want to?"

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"Roderich, out in the hall." The principal pointed at the door.

"Just so you know, there's something else coming." Roderich waved cheerfully at Alfred and Antonio before leaving the room.

"What else is coming?" The principal looked after him, staying where he was, "Well turn it off, whatever it is!"

"That would be completely disrespectful to Gilbert." Roderich smiled at him. "He's not around to keep class entertained anymore, so I thought it would be necessary to have something happen every once in a while."

"If you ever do this again, so help me…" The teacher whispered. "The classroom is soaked!"

"Yes. Yes it is." Roderich nodded, now standing in the doorway of the classroom. He looked around at everything that was now ruined. "But it was worth it."

"It was so worth it!" Alfred cheered.

"Encore!" Antonio cheered.

"NO encores!" The principal snapped.

Roderich looked at his watch, "Three. Two. One…"

"Turn it off!" The teacher ducked underneath her desk.

"RODERICH!" The principal yelled, as once again, the balloons started flying.

This was _so_ worth waking up early for. Roderich leaned against the doorframe, smiling as the water balloons broke against his classmates and their desks. He watched as a yellow water balloon hit the principal in the face and laughed. He was _so _getting suspended for this.

"Yaay!" Alfred stood up cheering and clapping, despite the flying water balloons. "Roderich, this was totally awesome!"

Antonio raised both hands in the air, "Class was so worth getting up for!"

Roderich smiled and waved at the class, who were now all laughing. The teacher crawled out from under her desk and stared at the class, before looking over at Roderich.

"I think. You surpassed Gilbert a bit. He never went to this extreme." The teacher pointed at the room.

"I like to think I made him smile." Roderich laughed.

"OUT." The principal pushed Roderich out the door, "And to the office!"

"I can walk! You don't have to push!" Roderich called, loud enough for the class to hear.

He could hear Alfred and Antonio laughing down the hall.

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><p>And thus endeth this quite long chapter. :) Roderich's school record is now completely wrecked. XD And Gilbert gets spared morning classes, or maybe not so spared. Oh well. *peace* Leave me a review~ :D<p> 


	13. Not being discussed and GO AWAY

Okay so here goes. I'm not feeling the best so I have no clue how long it's going to take me to actually update these chapters, but hoping it doesn't take too long here. Sorry guys. I lost a family member Friday and the update(s) got pushed back.

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><p>.<p>

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Gilbert scowled at the male sitting across from him. This was so not an awesome way to spend his morning. Ja, maybe he had wanted the chance to actually to talk to his vati, but not here. In an emotional craphole. Because that so admitted he had an emotional problem. Which technically he could blame on his being sick, right? Ja, totally. And that was Vati's fault. Not his.

"Ja it is your life to decide how you want to live it. But you won't be alive to live it much longer." He said that quite bluntly. Vati was mean.

Gilbert stuck his tongue out in response, "Whatever. I'm packing my living in until that day comes. What the hell do you care anyway? It's not like we even know each other. Other than being related by blood, there really isn't much else to say is there?" He tilted his head slightly. Okay so maybe not getting much sleep had left him in a really foul mood this morning.

"You don't have anything to say at all? Not to a _Vati_ you haven't talked to or seen for the past sixteen years of your life?" His father raised an eyebrow.

"Not one word." Gilbert shrugged before laughing, "What is there to say? Hi?"

"Mein gott, Roma was not kidding when he said you behaved strangely…" His father sighed heavily.

"Who the heck is Roma?" Gilbert just stared at him.

"Hm? The counselor you had before supper yesterday."

"Oh is that what he was supposed to be? He totally failed the counselor part of that." Gilbert laughed.

"Ja, well maybe if a student hadn't been ending any attempts at a conversation before it even started, Roma would have been able to succeed in that." He sighed heavily.

"Oh gee, I wonder who that was~" Gilbert stretched his legs out in front of him, grinning rather cockily. "Maybe if he hadn't been putting his damn foot in his mouth, I wouldn't have felt the need to end the conversation~"

"You know those counselors are here to help, right?"

"Oh, ja. They're really helping." Gilbert laughed, "They're doing such a fine job of it, too."

"So I see." His father sighed heavily.

Gilbert smirked slightly. Well this was going to be a long morning for both of them wasn't it? Unless his father wanted to leave now, which Gilbert would not be stopping him, at all. In fact, he would even be polite and open the door for him.

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Roderich sat in the office, hands folded in his lap, quietly waiting for the principal to finish drying off before being –probably rather rudely- dragged into the separate room that the principal usually resided in. It was worth it. Roderich nodded to himself, thinking back to the reactions his classmates had. Yes, it was well worth the detention he was sure to get. The lecture…he would have to decide the worth of that after he recovered from the –no doubt- ear blisters he was sure to get.

"Alright, Roderich, in my office. Now." The principal came back in through a separate door and motioned –rather angrily, Roderich noted- to the door marked with a gold nameplate.

"I know where it is. You don't have to point at the door." Roderich said, quite calmly, while he stood up and walked over to the office. He pushed open the door and walked in, feeling quite tempted to slam the door in the principal's face, but held it open politely for the –still slightly wet- principal.

"Now, I assume there is a good reason for your behavior in class." The principal growled, stalking to his desk.

"There is. And I have already said what it was." Roderich didn't sit down in the only other chair there was in the room. He preferred to stay standing. He hadn't exactly quite rehearsed what he would say in this situation, but if Gilbert could wing himself out of a situation, then so could Roderich. Of course, Gilbert was much more used to these kinds of situations as well.

"Because there are teachers who don't know how to have fun? This is a school, Roderich!" The principal snapped.

"I am well aware of that." Roderich sighed, rather annoyed, "You don't need to tell me that like I am some kindergarten child."

"These teachers are here to _teach._ They do so in whatever method they deem is the most effective for teenagers to absorb he information and actually learn." The principal started.

Here it comes. One long-winded lecture. Perhaps he should have taken a seat after all.

"Well the teachers certainly aren't here to loaf around." Roderich commented. He probably would do better to keep his mouth shut during the lecture, judging by the glare he was getting.

"I don't know what went through your mind yesterday or last night, but obviously _something_ happened to snap that mentality of yours." The principal sighed.

"My mentality is in no way, shape, or form _snapped_." Roderich hissed, "I am perfectly fine, and my mental condition is, in fact, the exact same as it was yesterday, and the day before."

"The Roderich who was here yesterday, certainly would not have launched water balloons through a classroom!" The principal snapped at him.

"The Roderich who was here yesterday, decided that life was too short to follow all of the rules all of the time, and decided to take a page from Gilbert's book of life." Roderich smiled, rather enjoying the sight of the principal's reddening face.

"Gilbert's book of life needs a new editor." The principal grumbled.

"Well, that is a statement that is rather late to be making, don't you think?" Roderich tilted his head, "Gilbert's book of life is written and cannot be edited, since he isn't here anymore."

The principal made a face at that remark. For what reason, Roderich didn't know, but something suddenly didn't seem right. Was he hiding something?

"Whether that statement is true or not…" The principal started.

"True or not? You read that letter in the assembly that stated that he was no longer among the living, how is that possibly leave an open opportunity for an 'or not' scenario?" Roderich crossed his arms across his chest and looked at the principal curiously.

Oh yes, there was _definitely_ something wrong here. That face was most certainly hiding something.

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"Obviously there is something I am needing to do, to make up the last sixteen years I wasn't around." Gilbert's father sighed heavily.

"Is there? I wasn't aware of it." Gilbert rolled his eyes slightly, "I am perfectly content with the way my life turned out, _danke_."

Okay that was probably a poor choice of words. His father raised an eyebrow and looked around the room, "You're happy with ending up in emotional counseling?"

"Ja, why not?" Gilbert laughed, "I certainly would have no idea if I would end up here if you had been around." That comment made vati wince~ Serves him right. So did not want to be having this conversation this damn early in the morning, or any time of the morning, or afternoon, or evening, or night.

"I suppose apologizing is out of the question."

"Ja, any apology would get thrown back in your face, more than likely along with something physical, and hard." Gilbert added.

"You are going to throw something at me?"

"I am rather tempted to do so." Gilbert shrugged offhandishly. Right now a chair was sounding good. And luckily there was some folding chairs near by.

"You and Ludwig are complete opposites…" His father sighed.

"Gee. I wonder if that was due to being raised by separate parents?" Gilbert leaned his head back against the wall.

Clearly, the conversation was being dug into a hole, and only getting deeper. Vati's putting his foot in his mouth as much as that stupid Roma-counselor-dude was. Oh…that Roma person was Italian, I should ask Lovi if they're related. Since speaking German should make me and Ludwig friends.

"I sense hostility…"

"Do you?" Gilbert looked at him, smirking slightly, "I wouldn't know why."

"Well obviously I don't know why either." His father gave him a –totally a mean one- glare.

"Ja, why would you know? How would you know? It's not like we ever spoke to each other before now. And frankly, I don't know why you came here in the first place." Gilbert rolled his eyes. Who was holding the shovel anyway? Can't tell if it's me or Vati digging the hole. Maybe we're digging separate holes? Can I hit him with my shovel?

"I thought it was rather obvious why I came here."

"Hm, really? It's about as obvious as why you're sensing hostility." Gilbert let his eyes roam around the conference room.

"I said I didn't know why I was…never mind." The adult version of Ludwig sighed heavily. Apparently he finally caught on to what was being said.

Gilbert just smirked slightly, and continued scanning the room. Maybe he should just leave.

"In any case, I'm here because of the transfusion you need."

Gilbert shifted his gaze to the other male for a brief moment, "I already said, I'm quite happy with the way my life turned out. Und if that's why you're here, then you're wasting your time, and mine."

"You don't want to live?"

"Nein." Gilbert stood up and yanked the door open, "Go home, _Vati._" He stalked out of the room, slamming the door behind him. No clue what time it was, no clue what time the next class started. Fricking fantastic.

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"That is not being discussed at the present time." The principal answered with a sigh.

"Excuse me?" Roderich raised both eyebrows, "How is that not being discussed?"

"It's not. In any case, you will be expected to clean up the classroom you ruined with your water balloons, as well as…"

"I'm sorry, that's not being discussed right now." Roderich sat in the seat across from the principal's desk.

"Excuse me?" The principal echoed Roderich's earlier words.

"Well obviously, if Gilbert's book of life isn't being discussed, then neither is my _punishment_ for making my fellow students laugh." Roderich kept his arms crossed and maintained a look of dignity. Gilbert would be having a fit right now.

"Those are two entirely different discussions." The principal glared at Roderich.

"Oh I don't think they are. I think they're all in one discussion." Roderich leveled his gaze on the principal.

"You are not leaving this office, until you agree to clean up the mess you made, and to serve your detention." The principal continued glaring.

"I am not leaving this office, until you explain what you meant." Roderich didn't look away and maintained his level of composure.

And so the stare-down begins. Who will break first?

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.

Gilbert climbed up onto his bed and laid down, hugging the pillow to his chest. Well now. This was a bit better. Not in class and away from Vati~. Yes, this was turning out to be a much better morning. Now all he had to do was listen for when the lunch bell would be called.

Gilbert snuggled under the blankets and rested his chin on the pillow. He half-wondered how the other three were doing in their classes but decided it was best to leave those thoughts be and get some much-needed sleep.

If it hadn't been for the damn door opening. And OF COURSE it's Vati. Apparently they told him the room. Sh*t. Gilbert rolled over and faced the wall instead. Not a good morning. Oh karma really does come back to bite you. _Mein Gott._

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><p>Yeah so Gilbert came out a little darker than usual in this chapter –at least I thought so-, sorry about that. Probably due to my emotional state of mind right now. Anyway, there's the update, take it or leave it, now you all know why the door was still locked to the office. :)<p> 


	14. It was worth it and Bliss?

Sorry about delay. Had to go to the funeral on Tuesday and my emotions were shot the rest of the day. Wednesday was just a day spent out at random spots with family, just having fun. I feel better now. :) So I shall attempt to update this now. I don't know why I censored in the last chapter, sorry about that. =_=;

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><p>.<p>

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Gilbert rolled his eyes as he heard (and felt, Lovino really wasn't kidding about that) the bed below him moving. At least he wasn't leaning on the bedframe. Gilbert rolled onto his back and glared up at the ceiling. Obviously he was _not_ going to give up anytime soon.

But then again…he wasn't talking either. Gilbert wondered for a moment if he had fallen asleep for a few minutes and it was actually Lovino below him, but that wouldn't make any sense at all. His watch still said they should be in their first class. If only for another five minutes or so.

Gilbert took out the crumpled piece of paper from his pocket and looked at his schedule for the day. He sighed and crumpled it back up, throwing it over the foot of the bed, giving up on it completely. This was a definite unawesome feeling right now. Can't even crack a smile. Gilbert rolled over to face the wall again, closing his eyes once more. _'I need Mattie or someone in here. Seriously. Make him go awaaaay.'_

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Roderich examined the office he was (still) sitting in. The principal certainly kept everything neat and organized, that was for certain. Nothing looked out of place…well. Almost nothing.

"Just to break the silence, and out of curiosity, why is that chair tipped over on its side?" Roderich asked.

The principal looked over at it, "Because the last student who was in here threw a fit. I never picked it up."

"Someone throws chairs? How juvenile." Roderich muttered under his breath.

"And rigging the classroom with water balloons wasn't?" The principal raised both eyebrows.

"That was a demonstration." Roderich corrected, "Not a juvenile acting out."

"Demonstration for what?"

"I've already said it twice now." Roderich commented, "How many times should I repeat it?"

_*knock knock*_

Roderich looked over at the door as someone rapped on the outside of it.

"Yes?" The principal sighed heavily.

"Mr. Smith, you have two students out here." The secretary peered into the room, "They've been out here for at least twenty minutes now."

"Sorry about that." Principal stood up and looked at Roderich, "You are required to clean up that classroom as well as serve detention…end of discussion." He added seeing Roderich open his mouth to argue.

"Discussion is not ended." Roderich stood up as well and glared at the principal.

"Would you prefer being suspended?" Mr. Smith raised an eyebrow.

"I don't personally care if it's detention or suspension, either way it's a mark on my record, but the discussion is not over until you say what you meant!" Roderich snapped.

Smith walked around the desk and forcibly pushed Roderich out of the office, "I am not discussing this. Mr. Jones, Mr. Carreido, what are you two doing here?"

Roderich looked at Alfred and Antonio startled.

"Well obviously our teachers sent us down here." Alfred laughed, "Why would we come down here voluntarily?"

Roderich sat in a chair next to Alfred and glared at the principal, "Discussion is not ended."

"You are going to be sitting there a long time." Mr. Smith shook his head, before motioning into his office, "Mr. Jones."

"You know I have a first name right? Just saying." Alfred ducked past the principal.

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Gilbert traced outlines on the wall with his hand. The silence in the room was getting rather uncomfortable at this point. Gilbert rolled over onto his back again. He felt the bed underneath him shifting slightly. Is he laying down or something? Gilbert rolled his eyes but didn't sit up. That would take way too much effort. And right now all he wanted to do was sleep.

"Are you asleep?"

"No. I'm just laying here with my eyes closed." Gilbert grumbled to the voice that floated up from underneath him. So much for the small hope that it was Lovino.

There was a large sigh in response. Apparently he didn't care much for sarcasm. Gilbert smirked.

"Can we talk at least?"

"Well I certainly wouldn't call this yelling." Gilbert responded, going back to tracing shapes on the wall.

"Why do you use so much sarcasm?" The bed moved again, apparently now he had gotten off, because the voice was a lot closer.

"It's a force of habit. Deal with it." Gilbert grumbled, closing his eyes again.

"You're tired?"

"Nein. I'm just taking a nap for the heck of it." Gilbert retorted.

Another large sigh.

"You asked for it that time." Gilbert commented.

"Ja, I know." He leaned on the bed.

Gilbert opened his eyes for a brief moment before closing them again.

"You didn't sleep well last night?"

"Seriously. Why else would I be so damn tired? No I didn't sleep well, these beds SUCK." Gilbert snapped, refraining from use of sarcasm only because of how annoyed he was getting.

"They're certainly not very stable." He commented.

"Can you go away? I'm freaking tired and I want to sleep." Gilbert rolled over and half-glared at him.

"I told you I came here to talk to you."

"Ja, I know you did. You talked, now go away." Gilbert turned to face the wall again.

"Do you talk to mutti like this, too?"

"Nein. I treat her with more respect." Gilbert answered.

"Not going to question that. I know the answer already…"

"Oh sure, go ahead and ask. I can give you another sarcastic comment." Gilbert smirked, closing his eyes once more.

"Nein, danke."

Gilbert forced himself to lay still as he felt a warm hand brushing the bangs out of his face. Why does this guy have to be so damn stubborn? Right now he felt like he could fall asleep and not wake up. Seriously, let a tired person sleep.

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Roderich looked at Antonio in confusion, "So what are you down here for?"

"I started throwing beach balls around in class." Antonio commented, swinging his legs back and forth.

"…Why would you do that?" Roderich stared at him in disbelief.

"For fun!" Antonio laughed, "And hey, it worked!"

Roderich looked at the opposite wall and smiled. Well. Apparently Antonio and Alfred had taken what happened in the first class to heart.

"Well then. I will head back to class now." Roderich stood up, brushing himself off. At least his clothes weren't soaked now.

"What about the discussion you said wasn't over?" Antonio blinked up at him.

"I'll let it go. It was probably just a poor choice of words on his part." Roderich shrugged, "And besides, third bell will be starting in another half hour. I should get ready." He turned on his heel and walked out of the office.

Now the question remained…should he act out again or behave? He already had a detention. Roderich tilted his head. If he remembered correctly, then there should be a test today. He shouldn't interrupt that. Roderich smiled a bit. Shouldn't was the key word there. Of course he was going to make this the one day of Gilbert-styled-fun he would have.

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Gilbert sat on the floor and glanced around him. Okay. So sleeping was obviously the worst idea ever. Because now…he was…_here._ Gilbert looked up, left, right, and behind him. The view didn't change. This clearly was a nightmare of some sort. Well. At least vati isn't here. Gilbert shrugged and laid down.

Something seemed off about this place though. Probably due to it being a dream of some sort. On the plus side, he didn't feel anything. It was just…bliss. Gilbert smiled and stretched his arms above his head. "Now if all sleep was like this, I wouldn't have a single morning of having to drag myself out of bed~!" Gilbert relaxed again and glanced around himself once more. Still nothing. "No nightmares…just nothing but black. I can handle this." Gilbert closed his eyes and smiled. "No strange noises, no vati talking my ear off, no annoying counselors…nothing at all~"

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><p>Thus the chapter does end. Sorry this one was a little shorter. It…kind of had to be. So leave me a review! And I will wait to see how many people realize what's going on by the end. :)<p> 


	15. Change and Memory Lane

Sorry for length of time in between updates. I was distracted by Sudoku and Sims 3. XD I shall do my best to update in a decent amount of time between stories~ :D This might come rather short…sorry in advance. There were actually four or five reviewers who realized what happened by the end of last chapter, so yay~ XD I'll try not to confuse anyone here in this one.

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><p>.<p>

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Roderich continued walking down the hall, deep in thought about how to go through the next class. It never really occurred to him that he saw Arthur most of the day. Especially when they had student council work to take care of. Now that could be pushed off to another day. Roderich smiled a bit, any other day there was no way he would be pushing it off. Today however…this was not a normal day.

"Hey."

Roderich blinked and turned around. "Hm? Hello." He tilted his head in confusion at Cruz. It must have been the assembly. Twice in two days now that this person had come up to him.

Cruz turned his head down a hall that was a little ways behind him, "Wasn't your class that way?"

Roderich looked over startled. He hadn't even been paying attention, "Oh. I guess it was. Thank you. But…your class is in the other direction, isn't it? Why aren't you in class anyway?" There he went sounding like a teacher again. Roderich mentally hit himself on the back of the head. No wonder Gilbert always laughed at him.

Cruz made a face in response, "Class ended early. Alfred decided to duct-tape the room."

Roderich looked at him in disbelief, "Duct-taped the room? Oh geez…the teacher must have lost it." He shook his head, though he was rather amused by it.

"Yeah just a bit. It didn't help that the rest of the class was laughing." Cruz shrugged, "He just told everyone to leave."

"Well there's one more teacher who probably won't renew his contract at the end of the year." Roderich sighed. "People are going to start wondering about this school."

"Yeah we don't really have the best reputation, do we?" Cruz scratched the back of his head.

"No, we don't. The school board has gotten so many complaints from parents and teachers, it really is ridiculous. But…it's our fault, isn't it? We're the ones who are acting out." Roderich looked down the hall, staring off into space.

"Yeah I suppose. Though they can't expect a radical change in a 24-hour period of time." Cruz scoffed.

"Change…" Roderich blinked. Something clicked in the back of his mind. _'Wait…wasn't there that paper for the mission for change? I don't ever know what happened to that.' _"Maybe they are."

Cruz burst out laughing not even a second later, "That is not happening in this place!"

Roderich smiled in return. Cruz was definitely right about that. "No perhaps not. But…" Roderich smirked. That just was a brilliant idea that came to mind. And if he remembered correctly from the papers, then today would be the _perfect_ day to pull it off.

"But what?" Cruz looked at him, looking rather curious and confused at the same time.

Roderich smiled, "I just got an idea, thanks to you." And a really good one.

"Why do I get the feeling that idea is going to get me into something I do not want to be a part of…" Cruz sighed heavily. That's right, Cruz did have a school record…nowhere near the length of Gilbert's record, but still rather lengthy.

"Well now. The school board is visiting the school after lunch. I say we give them a warm welcome." Roderich laughed. Oh yes, this was going to be fun. Alfred and Antonio would be sure to join in as well.

"Warm welcome…what is the definition of warm that you are using?" Cruz crossed his arms. He was looking rather skeptical about the idea. But Roderich noted that Cruz hadn't refused outright.

Roderich looked up and down the hall, "How long do you think this hallway is?"

"Hm?" Cruz looked up and down the hall as well, "No clue. Measuring is not my strongsuit."

"You have a good arm don't you? For throwing?" Roderich asked curious.

"I can throw things pretty far, yes. But what exactly are you planning on me throwing?" Cruz looked at Roderich, his eyes narrowing slightly.

"Think the cafeteria will supply some fruit or vegetables?" Roderich looked at him with an innocent expression.

"You're planning on throwing food at the school board? How the blazes is that going to help the school record?" Cruz stared at him incredulously.

"Just watch." Roderich laughed, "If anyone gets detention, it's going to be me, relax."

"I'm not worried about the detention. It's more of the suspension or expulsion that I was thinking of." Cruz snorted.

"Well then, think of it as a permanent vacation!" Roderich smiled.

Cruz stared at him blankly. "That's a different way of putting it. But I can live with that."

Roderich smiled, "Good. Then I should head to class. I'll be nice and not act out this time." He rolled his eyes slightly and headed back towards the hallway, "Meet me here at lunch? I'm going to try and pull Antonio and Alfred into this, too. Since they decided to disrupt class anyway."

"Sure. Might as well have other people sitting in the office." Cruz wandered back down the hall.

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Gilbert continued to lay right where he was at. Still not caring about the lack of any substance around him.

"Where am I at?"

"No clue." Gilbert answered automatically. He turned his head and looked up to see Matthew was sitting beside him.

Matthew turned his head, "You weren't there a minute ago."

"Neither were you." Gilbert snorted, "Jolly hello to you, too." He looked back straight up again.

"This place is cold." Matthew sighed.

"Is it? I can't feel anything." Gilbert blinked, "It feels nice to me." Feeling nothing was a little strange, but also, not complaining.

"You must have better circulation than me, then." Matthew sighed, "Why is there…nothing."

"Haven't the foggiest." Gilbert laughed, closing his eyes once more, "I don't really care either. This is the best sleep I've had in a long time! No nightmares, nothing~!"

"Eh. I suppose that's one way of looking at it." Matthew made a face, "But…are we really sleeping? How is this sleeping if we can talk to each other?"

Gilbert opened one eye again, "Hm. Good point." He sat up and rubbed his head, "But…I'm not about to question it either." He covered his mouth to suppress a yawn and laid right back down.

Matthew stood up, "Well I'm not about to sit here. It feels like something is going to come out of nowhere and scare me."

"Have fun wandering." Gilbert waved and closed his eyes again. He opened his eyes after he heard Matthew walk away and watched the blonde vanish into thin air. Now _that_ was creepy. Gilbert sat up, "Hey, Matthew!"

No answer.

Gilbert made a face and stood up, starting after where the other had vanished. "Uh…why can I not see him?" Gilbert started running, but still couldn't find where Matthew had gone. "Oh this is just great. Now where is he? It's not like there's anything in front of me!"

Gilbert went to take another step and suddenly felt like he was falling, "Crap! Okay maybe there is!" When he landed, it didn't hurt at all. Gilbert opened one eye and found he was at school. "Oh great. What is this, memory lane?" Gilbert looked around him, scowling.

He stalked down the hall, passing by people without them turning around at all. This was definitely strange. "I liked having nothing around me a lot better than this." Gilbert grumbled. "What kind of freakish dream is this?" He glanced up and down the hall. Didn't help he felt really out of place because no one spoke to him at all.

Gilbert sighed and continued walking, though he stopped when he saw a familiar face. "Definitely memory lane." Gilbert tilted his head, watching Roderich from a distance, "Now what month is this from?"

Roderich was talking to Elizaveta, so it couldn't have been this year. Roderich wasn't talking to her at all this year after the rather abrupt dumping he got from her. Gilbert made a face. He glanced behind him and saw Matthew walking with Cruz. "This is definitely last year. He looks really annoyed." Gilbert smirked a bit at the look that Cruz had on his face.

"I remember this now~" Gilbert laughed, "That was right after Cruz got into a fistfight!" Gilbert turned his head and saw himself coming down the hall with Alfred. "Okay. This is weird. I'm watching myself."

"_Oh, Gilbert!" Elizaveta instantly turned to the Gilbert that was walking down the hall with Alfred, completely ignoring the conversation she had just been having._

"Huh? Wait…" Gilbert blinked, "I wonder if I was the reason Roddy got dumped…"

"_What?" Gilbert just glared at Elizaveta, "You know you can continue talking to your boyfriend and stop talking to me. That would make me absolutely ecstatic."_

"Hahahaha, I had such an attitude~" Gilbert laughed. The look on Elizaveta's face was priceless, as was Roderich's.

"_I was just saying hello, it's called being polite, you know." Elizaveta huffed._

_Roderich just shook his head and went back to going through his locker._

"_Really? I wasn't aware you were polite." Gilbert snorted, "You're certainly not being polite to him." He motioned to Roderich and smirked._

_Roderich bristled and glared at Gilbert._

_Elizaveta looked at Gilbert, offended, "You are completely rude!"_

"_Thanks for noticing~" Gilbert laughed, and walked right by her, smirking at Roderich as he passed by the male._

_Roderich just huffed and turned away again._

"That breakup was totally because of me." Gilbert slapped a hand to his forehead. He watched himself walk away with Alfred, who was now laughing after the conversation exchange had just witnessed. Gilbert looked back to where Roderich and Elizaveta were standing, watching Roderich.

"_Honestly. How that Gilbert doesn't even get expelled is beyond my imagination." Elizaveta huffed, flipping her hair over her shoulder._

"_Really. I imagine it's not that hard at all for you to imagine. Besides, who else would you flirt with if he wasn't here?" Roderich closed his locker door and walked away from her._

"_I am not flirting with him!" Elizaveta stalked after Roderich._

"_You most certainly are. You do it every time you see him, it's no wonder he gets so annoyed at you." Roderich shook his head._

Gilbert skipped along after Roderich, "I feel like I'm in someone else's flashback. Because I totally didn't know any of this!" He glanced around him but didn't see anyone that stood out, "Maybe something is showing me this for a reason?"

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><p>I hope I didn't confuse anyone with the memory there at the end. = w = Anyway, leave me a review~ I love you if you do~ :D<p> 


	16. Things to do and Seriously, stop!

So I got a couple comments that my chapters are short…that last one was one of the longest chapters in this story I thought. o-o; Anyway, also in regards to updating: I work third shift, I'm only on my computer in the morning, so that's why the updates are once or twice a week. It takes me a while to actually type a chapter, because I prefer having an idea for what to do with the chapter rather than just make an idea up on the top of my head. Hopefully this clears a few things up for some readers. :)

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><p>.<p>

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Roderich leaned on his desk, tapping his pencil in annoyance at the teacher. They had been on the same slide for the last ten minutes. Ordinarily this would be considered a good time to pick up extra notes, but for some reason right now it was just tedious. He glanced around him and noticed that several of his classmates had given into the call of sleep and laid their heads down. But the teacher droned on, completely oblivious to this. Roderich looked back towards the front of the room, glaring slightly. If he sat closer to the front he'd unplug the machine that was showing the powerpoint slides.

'_If I had known it was going to be this boring, I would have stayed in the office.'_ Roderich thought to himself, slumping back in his chair. He decided to instead use the notepaper in front of him to write down his plans for the afternoon. Definitely needed to go to the cafeteria and 'borrow' some of the salad bar they had set up for lunchtime. Roderich tapped the eraser-end of his pencil against his chin thoughtfully. He knew the school board was coming at noon…so they would be missing their fifth class, obviously. More than likely the rest of the day if they were caught. Roderich smiled a bit. For him it would probably be a temporary vacation. Roderich looked down at the paper again.

The athletics department had an archery team that uses soft-tipped arrows…Roderich thought about it for a moment. Could always attach papers to the end of the arrows and start shooting them at the school board while they're out in the courtyard still. The windows conveniently overlooked the front gate anyhow. Roderich nodded and wrote the idea down. He glanced up at the teacher again and found that they were still on the same slide they had been on for the past fifteen minutes now. Roderich shook his head and returned his attention to the paper in front of him…at least until a sharp blast jolted everyone awake, and made everyone else jump. Roderich looked up, knowing full-well where the noise had come from. _'I was wondering when he would start that.'_ Roderich shook his head and went back to the paper.

"Who just did that?" The teacher looked around the room in annoyance, "I know that was an airhorn!"

"Who's stupid enough to bring an airhorn to class?"

Roderich didn't bother looking up to see who was speaking. _'So the supplies needed are…from the cafeteria…need arrows from the athletic storage room…and need someone to make copies in the office. Probably going to need someone to distract the secretary and principal if necessary in order to make the copies.'_ Roderich frowned. This was sounding like they'd need more than three people. Antonio would more than likely help, but who else would he ask? Roderich tapped the pencil against his chin again. Who else _could_ he ask? There was Feliciano and Ludwig who sat with Antonio at lunch…but Feliciano had a notorious way of messing things up, and he wasn't too sure if Ludwig would go for this idea or not. _'Still…who else would I ask? Me…Alfred…Cruz…Antonio…who else is there?'_ Roderich looked back up and saw the slideshow had restarted from its resumed point, and surprisingly, had moved to the next slide.

Roderich returned his gaze to the paper on his desk. Not going to even bother to take notes today. Probably going to be suspended for the next week anyhow. Water balloons. Still have some leftover from this morning. Cruz and Alfred both had good throwing arms…out the windows or down the hall, either one would work just as well. Roderich nodded and wrote it down on the paper.

"What're you working on?" A soft whisper suddenly spoke from next to him.

Roderich looked at the teacher with a blank expression, "Something for student council." That was probably one of the stupidest lies he had ever told. Who would believe he needed something from the salad bar for student council?

"Oh?" The teacher leaned over and peered at the paper. She seemed to scan over the list that Roderich had been writing down.

'_Is she going to take this…because I can easily write it down on another piece of paper.'_ Roderich just stared at her with the same blank expression.

"This sounds like fun." She smiled cheerfully.

Roderich's blank expression became one of disbelief. Somehow he wasn't expecting a teacher to go for this.

"So what is the student council planning with this?" The teacher tapped the paper with a curious expression on her face.

Roderich looked at the paper then back at the teacher, who was still smiling. There was no way he could come up with a believable lie on such short notice, "Upcoming event." Okay, that wasn't a lie, it was hopefully just as much truth as absolutely necessary.

"Really?" She seemed to perk up at this, "The school could use a little cheering up after the last couple days of school, when is this event taking place?"

Roderich made a mental note to never write notes that did not pertain to this class while this teacher was doing a slideshow ever again. He noticed with some amusement that everyone else was now completely focused on the powerpoint, not wanting to get in trouble. _'I think I ruined Alfred's fun with the air horn.'_ "Not been discussed yet, still trying to get more people on the committee." Roderich commented.

"How many people do you have so far?" She tilted her head.

"Three, possibly four, I haven't seen him to ask yet." Roderich managed to keep an outward look of calm while mentally slapping himself on the back of the head for writing the list during class.

"Hm…this event would definitely call for more than four people…" She looked back over the paper again, "Because certainly the staff would want to know what this is for." She tapped the option that read _Borrowing part of the salad bar_. "Does this mean the bar itself or the food on the bar?"

"Food on the bar." Roderich answered flatly. _'Why would we need the bar itself?'_

"For a snack?" She looked at him blankly.

Roderich just returned the same blank look, "It's not for eating."

"What would you use salad for other than eating?" Now she looked even more confused.

"Possibly for promoting a teamwork activity amongst the committee members." Roderich shrugged. That was not a lie. Stretching the truth a bit, but it still wasn't a lie.

The teacher clapped her hands together, "Oh~! Then how about this one?" She pointed to the arrows from the athletic storage room.

"Strictly metaphorical. Aiming for change." Roderich answered. _'Now __**that **__was an all-out lie.'_

"You really thought this out!" The teacher exclaimed, looking amazed.

Roderich winced inwardly. _'Please don't be happy about that.'_

"What copies are you making?" The teacher looked back at the list again, the smile never wavering.

"The class results for testing." Roderich caught Alfred looking back at them with a confused expression on his face.

"…I'm confused on this one. What do you need those for?" The teacher looked back at him.

Roderich glanced back at her, "We have the highest test scores in the district, but when it comes to having 'proper behavior' as put by the school board, we're ranked one of the lowest. Either the definition needs to change of proper behavior, or our behavior needs to change."

"Or the school board needs to change." She commented.

'_I wasn't going to say that.'_ Roderich stared at her blankly.

"Then…this one?" She moved down the list to the water balloons.

"Water balloon throwing is one of the most favored activities, especially in hot weather, to get rid of stress." Roderich didn't even hesitate before answering. At least that one he had time to think over for a quick response.

"Oh, that's a good idea~" The teacher perked up, "This committee sounds like it's going to be fun!"

Roderich inwardly winced again. _'Please don't ask to join.'_

"It looks like you have mostly everything thought out then except for when it's going to be~" She smiled cheerfully.

"Yes, well, that will take time until I can figure out who else is going to join the committee as well." Roderich pulled out a small white cloth and decided to distract himself by cleaning the lens of his glasses.

"Well if you need a teacher for anything, just let me know! I'll be happy to help!" She smiled and happily went back up to the front of the room to resume her lecture on the powerpoint.

Roderich sighed in relief. That had been rather close for comfort. He reverted his attention to his list and tapped his pencil against his desk again. If they didn't want to be caught they were going to have to run fast to their fifth class. _'Probably get to our seats just in time for someone to come in the room and demand for us to leave again.'_ Roderich shook his head with a smile. If that happened, they can pull the 'innocent until proven guilty' act, right? Of course Alfred's acting skills needed serious help, he wasn't too sure about Cruz, but Antonio definitely couldn't keep a straight face, and he, himself, couldn't even tell a lie strong enough to hold water.

Roderich blinked for a moment. Water…if they made the floors wet in the hallway then that would slow the school board members down. Buckets of water. Roderich nodded and wrote it down on the list. Of course if this teacher ever found out what happened with the school board, she would know instantly who planned it. Oh well. Roderich smiled and tapped his pencil on the desk again. It would be well worth anything the school tried to punish him with…at least he hoped so.

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Gilbert found himself suddenly aware of what felt like a weight on his chest. It was making it rather uncomfortable to breathe. He shook his head and tried to focus on the memory that was around him, but found it fading from sight fast. "Now where am I going?" Gilbert looked around and found he was in the same black space he had occupied earlier. "Oh great. Hey maybe I can find Mattie now." Gilbert glanced around, but didn't see his blonde-haired friend anywhere.

He went to take a step but a sharp pain in his chest made him fall down instead. "What the heck was that?" Gilbert curled up on the ground, or what felt like the ground and whimpered. "That hurt!" Somewhere in the distance he could hear voices talking back and forth to each other. Gilbert glanced around him but couldn't see anything. Another jolt of pain went through his chest and Gilbert curled up again.

"Okay whoever is doing that, seriously needs to stop. That hurts!" Gilbert cursed through gritted teeth. For a minute he was blinded by a flash of white, and thought he could see people standing around him, but the vision faded and he was back in the darkness again. Gilbert tilted his head, "Now what the heck was that? Am I in the hospital or something?"

The voices sounded closer now, he could make out some of what they were saying. But it still didn't make sense. Gilbert growled, "At least speak in terms I can understand!"

Another jolt of pain caused Gilbert to whimper again, "Okay that I can understand, but would you knock it off already?" His vision went to that same room again and he could barely make out a couple nurses and one doctor. Oh that explained it. He really was in the hospital. He was about to curse them out when he found his vision went back to black again. "Really? How many times do I have to come back here?" Gilbert covered his eyes with an arm, letting out a quiet groan. This really was not his day. He'd rather be back in the conference room talking with his vati then be here…wherever here was. Oh. If he was in the hospital, then that meant that sharp pain was that defibrillator thing. Which meant…being here was pretty much equal to being dead. Gilbert sat upright. Wait, did that mean Matthew was dead, too? Gilbert looked around in a panic, "Crap! Mattie! Mattie!"

He laid back down instantly, as the pain suddenly made it feel like his chest was on fire. "Seriously, stop using the damn thing!" Gilbert reopened his eyes and found the hospital was back in view again. Why did they have to try so many times…probably because Gilbert kept responding. He looked around the room blankly for a moment. The black space wasn't coming back. Did that mean he didn't have to have that pain again? Gilbert's gaze landed on the blonde-haired male standing not far from the bed. His face was rather pale, full of concern and worry. If he had enough strength, Gilbert would have swore at him but opted to glare in his direction instead. It got the message across with half the energy.

"Looks like he's staying with us this time." The doctor standing next to the bed sighed in relief, "That was a close one."

Ja. Really close. Thanks for making my chest hurt like hell. Gilbert's glare went to the doctor instead.

The doctor seemed to ignore the look Gilbert was giving him and instead told the nurse to keep an eye on the monitors and walked out of the room.

Monitors? Gilbert glanced to his left and found a heart monitor beeping steadily beside him. Oh. That monitor. He glared at it and was half-tempted to rip the thing out of his arm but that would have taken more energy than he had at the moment. Gilbert just closed his eyes again and tried to focus on something other than the dull pain that was still thudding in his chest.

"Gilbert?"

Gilbert opened his eyes half-way and managed a glare before closing them again. Definitely worn out now. Why, he had no clue, he wasn't even doing anything other than laying here. He became slightly aware that his dad was now sitting next to him, but didn't open his eyes or try to speak. Sleep was sounding like a good option right now. Maybe he could go back to memory lane and just stay there for a while longer.

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><p>This is going to be the only update for possibly the next couple days. Unfortunately I caught a bad cough of some sort, and right now it feels like I'm coughing up a lung. My ribs hurt, my stomach hurts, and my back hurts from coughing so much. But hey, leave me a review anyway, so I can laugh and cheer up a little. :D and this was definitely one of the longest chapters in this story so far.<p> 


	17. Stupid Alfred and Roddy was awesome!

I love all my ninjas who reviewed the last chapter and came out of hiding~ :DDDD This update is coming really soon after the last one, but oh well, I feel all motivated to write. (even though I should be cleaning my room right now, still sick, don't wanna)

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Roderich stared blankly at Alfred's empty seat. One moment he had been sitting there…but the next, he was gone and the teacher was leaning out the door, calling after someone who didn't come back. Did something happen? Roderich looked around him confused, but it looked like his classmates were just as confused as he was.

"Uh…" The teacher turned around back to look at the class. Her expression was one of obvious what-do-I-do-here?

Roderich looked over at Alfred's seat again. _'He left everything behind…'_

"Well…u-um…" She clapped her hands together nervously, "Roderich, can you go see if you can find him please?"

Roderich just stared at her blankly before shutting his notebook with a sigh, "Fine. I'm going." He walked out of the classroom, leaving his books behind as well. Hopefully he would be coming back, even if it meant dragging Alfred with him.

Roderich glanced up and down the hallway as he walked, looking for any sign of Alfred, or at least someone he could ask if they had seen Alfred go by. "Honestly. I have no idea if I'm even going in the right direction!" Roderich ran a hand through his hair in frustration. "Just what got into him all of a sudden?"

Roderich continued going, passing by the cafeteria. He halted in his steps and peered back into the open door. It looked like all the cafeteria monitors were out of the lunchroom for the moment. "This…is opportunity." He leaned in and looked around the room again. No one there. Where were they all at? Roderich stepped into the cafeteria, after making sure the hallway was empty. If he was caught, he could always say he just came down to get lunch to take back to the student council room.

Roderich nodded to himself and walked silently over to the kitchen area. He leaned in the doorway and found it to be completely empty. _'That's strange.'_ Roderich tilted his head but looked over at the salad bar where it stood completely unguarded. _'But this really is the perfect opportunity.'_

Roderich looked back in the kitchen again, he couldn't see anything to carry anything in though. _'How do I transport now?'_ Roderich stepped into the kitchen, and quickly noticed a large silver pot sitting on the floor. Peering in, he discovered it was completely filled with tomatoes. Apparently they had some leftover after making the tomato soup. _'They're sure to notice this go missing. But right now, there's no one here, so at the moment. They won't miss it.'_ Roderich picked up the pot and hurried out the staff entrance.

Fortunately the staff entrance of the cafeteria wasn't that far down the hall from the student council room. He hurried down the hall and pushed open the door to the student council room with his foot. It was empty as always. Roderich placed the pot so it was hidden behind the door and left again, closing the door behind him. One thing off the list. Back to looking for Alfred.

Roderich went along, ignoring the feeling of worry that he would be found out by the next person who he came across. That was just ridiculous. Reading minds was impossible. Roderich nodded to himself and kept going. He glanced up and down the hall, turning a corner while looking in the opposite direction.

"Ah."

Roderich turned to find himself facing Ludwig. "Hello? Why are you not in class?"

"Oh…I was just wandering. Class was dismissed early, we got done with a test ahead of time." Ludwig said calmly.

"What, the teacher couldn't even keep you all in the same room for another fifteen minutes?" Roderich frowned, "What kind of teacher does that?" He rested his hands on his hips. _'I'm right back to normal.'_

Ludwig just shrugged it off, "I guess not."

"Oh, whatever, have you seen Alfred? I'm looking for him after he left class." Roderich waved a hand around, attempting to wave the thought away that had just popped up in the back of his head. _'No no, today I will not sound like I'm critiquing even the teachers.'_

"No. I was looking for him as well. I just ran into him not that long ago, he looked upset about something but kept going insisting he was fine. I must have made a wrong turn." Ludwig looked around.

"Oh for…" Roderich ran a hand through his hair again, "What has gotten into him?" He sighed heavily and dropped his hand to his side again, "Well fine, if you came from that way and didn't see Alfred, then I'm headed in this direction." He turned and started walking in the opposite direction.

"Ah…" Ludwig started after him, much to Roderich's annoyance.

"Was there something you wanted to ask?" Roderich turned and half-glared at him.

"You were friends with Gilbert, right?" Ludwig tilted his head.

"No." Roderich said without hesitation and quickly started walking away again. He could feel his face burning in embarrassment. There was no way he was friends with Gilbert!

Ludwig matched Roderich's pace and stayed right behind him, "Sorry, I just saw you two with each other a lot."

"Any time you saw us together was completely coincidence, we are not friends, we didn't even get along with each other!" Roderich snapped in frustration, "We were always arguing, I don't even know how you got the impression we were friends!"

"It looked more like friendly bickering. Gilbert was always laughing." Ludwig responded, still in the same expressionless tone.

"Well that's Gilbert's personality isn't it?" Roderich retorted.

"Is it?" Ludwig asked.

Roderich didn't respond and kept walking. There was no way he was getting caught up in this conversation right now. But then…if Gilbert wasn't his friend, why did he have his number in his cell phone? And why was he trying so hard now for Gilbert's sake? Roderich slowed his pace and frowned. Gilbert wouldn't have responded if he actually hated Roderich, right? Roderich felt his face grow hot again and shook his head angrily. Now is NOT the time to be thinking about this!

"Hm?" Roderich stopped when someone came out from the adjoining hallway.

Antonio stared at him for a second, but his gaze shifted to Ludwig and he seemed to stiffen, "Oh not _you again._" Antonio just stalked right by them without saying anything else.

"Ah." Ludwig half-turned after Antonio, "What did I do?"

Roderich mentally slapped his forehead. He still needed to ask Antonio about meeting up with them after lunch. Well, he'd just have to sit at Antonio's table and ask then. Roderich nodded and kept going. Right now, he still needed to find Alfred. Where on earth did Alfred go off to? He should have gotten Alfred's number from Arthur. This was ridiculous.

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Gilbert pressed random buttons on his phone, blatantly ignoring the person sitting next to him. _'I would rather be back in that craphole of an emotional facility than be here.'_ He blinked when he saw he had a new message flashing at the top of the screen. _'Someone sent me a mail?'_ Gilbert opened the message and saw it had a video. His face instantly brightened. _'No way! Roddy sent me that video~'_ Gilbert instantly sat up, startling Regis (Gilbert only learned his first name by pretending to be asleep and hearing the doctor calling him that).

Gilbert waited for the video to download, rather impatiently, and instantly pressed play when it popped up on the screen. _'So want better quality for this phone.'_ Gilbert watched the video play in amazement, watching the classroom erupt into chaos as something went flying through the air.

Regis leaned over and watched the video over Gilbert's shoulder.

Gilbert's eyes sparkled as he watched the balloons hit their mark on several objects around the room, "Oh man~ this is great! Roddy's awesome!" Gilbert squinted at the screen for a second. "What happened to Alfred's hand?"

"Hm?" Regis leaned closer to look at the screen as well.

"Blonde guy." Gilbert pointed to the screen where Alfred was at, "Oh. There's stupid principal….ahahahahaha!" Gilbert almost dropped the phone from laughing so hard when the water balloon hit the principal on the side of the head.

Regis smiled slightly, "When was this taken?"

Gilbert blinked for a moment, "Dunno. This morning? Is it still the same day?" Gilbert tilted his head slightly. He grinned as Roderich stood up announcing himself as being guilty. "Oh man…what I wouldn't give to have seen the look on the principal's face!"

"This morning…? He sent this to a phone belonging to a person he thinks is dead?" Regis blinked.

"Ja. He thinks it's a ghost texting him." Gilbert continued to watch the video, completely nonchalant. "Oh man, he so out-did himself on this one. I totally gotta hug him the next time I see him~"

"Who would be gullible enough to believe it's a ghost texting their phone?" Regis gaped at him.

"That's the most expression I've ever seen you use." Gilbert said flatly, before redirecting his attention back to the phone screen, "…and apparently Roderich is gullible enough."

He turned up the volume a bit and blinked. _'His reason for doing this? He…quoted me.'_ Gilbert looked at the screen in shock for a minute. _'Roddy actually took what I said to heart~'_ He smiled slightly, tilting his head and watching the rest of the scene play out.

Regis continued watching without further comment, "He's getting in a lot of trouble for this."

Gilbert grinned as he heard Roderich's comment from outside the door about not pushing him down the hall, "He must have gotten a detention at least." _'I totally gotta thank him for sending me this! This just made my day so much better!'_ Gilbert opened up a text and sent a response to Roderich about the video and smiled, "That made my day so much better~"

Regis looked at Gilbert blankly, "Did you send the message?"

"Ja, why?" Gilbert stared at him, his eyes went back to the screen. "Hm?" He opened his outbox and re-read the message he had sent. "…I sent that on auto-pilot. Shit."

"Nice one." Regis commented.

_**Hey Roddy~ Thanks so much for the video, it was completely awesome! You really can have fun if you try, and you totally just made my day so much better! Completely forgot about that unawesome morning I've had so far.**_

"…" Gilbert's face reddened a bit, "Well…maybe he'll just think there's a life in the afterlife."

"His reaction to this should be hilarious." Regis smiled a bit, "This should be amusing."

"Ja, ja. Go right on ahead and laugh." Gilbert glared at him, "I'm still out of it, alright?"

"I can tell." Regis commented.

Gilbert glared at his phone in silence, "….well maybe he won't even realize he got a message."

"You keep telling yourself that." Regis leaned on the bed slightly.

"What kind of a crappy supportive vati are you?" Gilbert yelled.

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><p>So this chapter covered a bit. *nods* Gilbert finally saw the video, totally screwed up the message, and actually called Regis his dad. :) And Roderich's first couple steps to his grand plan is underway~ 8D Leave me a review! You too ninjas who came out of hiding~<p> 


	18. Plans are made and Unawesome beepy thing

:D Yay~ So it's about lunchtime now for those who are still in school! Gilbert's still in the hospital (where he's going to remain for a bit much to his dismay). So we are moving right along!

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><p>.<p>

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Roderich hurried down the hallway. He had completely lost track of time while trying to find Alfred, and the bell ended up ringing. _'I should have brought my books with me!'_ It didn't take him long, much to his surprise, to reach his classroom and he looked in quickly to make sure he wasn't interrupting the teacher talking to someone who may have stayed behind. But the room was empty, not even the teacher was there. Roderich raised an eyebrow but collected his things from his desk near the back of the room.

On his way out, he noticed Alfred's books were already gone, so the blonde must have been here already. Roderich shook his head and hurried out, making a stop at his locker to drop everything off except for a notebook. He took out a box from the bottom shelf and carried it with him, his notebook balanced on top. Fortunately the box wasn't heavy.

By the time he had gotten to the cafeteria, the line for the meal he wanted was almost completely gone, so Roderich waited for the tray to be handed to him rather than go to the table and then come back. He balanced the tray on top of his notebook and headed off into the main part of the lunchroom, finding that Antonio was sitting at his (Roderich's) regular table.

Roderich sat down while Antonio was blowing on a spoonful of soup, and slid the box on the chair to his right. He gave a quizzical look to the mop bucket that was currently sitting on the chair to Antonio's left. But Antonio didn't explain it at all, just gave him a wide grin and went back to eating. _'Well then.'_ Roderich decided not to question it, and instead focus on the food tray in front of him.

"Oh hey, someone said you wanted these." Antonio turned to the seat on his right and picked up a sheet of paper before handing it to Roderich.

Roderich took the paper, confused as to what it might be, before reading over it. He cheered up considerably, and looked up at Antonio, "Who dropped this off?"

"Dunno. Some person who dropped 'em here and kept right on going." Antonio commented calmly, stirring his soup around in the little bowl. Roderich wondered who on earth would know he even wanted these copies made, but shrugged it off.

"Oh. Well then, this helps a lot. How many copies are there?" Roderich asked, laying the paper down on the box next to him.

Antonio turned to his right again, "A lot."

"Perfect. Just need a few more things then." Roderich picked up his notebook, and opened it to the correct page. He tapped his pen against it, while looking over the list of items he decided they needed for the afternoon. _'Almost there…'_ Roderich glanced at the yellow mop bucket sitting next to Antonio. _'That would work for transporting water…it's what it's used for after all.'_

Antonio looked up from his tray again, in time to see Roderich's stare, "What?"

"I may need to borrow that." Roderich commented, motioning to the bucket, "That would work perfectly."

"If you want it, go for it. It's just holding that chair down." Antonio responded, and continued to sip his soup.

Roderich raised an eyebrow at this, but didn't get the chance to ask, because Alfred suddenly plopped down next to him, "Oh there you are. I was looking for you." Roderich gave him a look he meant to come across as stern (and probably failed miserably), "Where on earth did you go during last class?"

"Huh? Oh sorry. Just felt the need to get the heck out of there. It's all good, I'm feeling better." Alfred waved a hand cheerfully.

Roderich gazed doubtfully at Alfred. He was certainly a lot more cheerful than he seemed during the class period. Perhaps he had gone down to guidance. Deciding that this must have been where Alfred was at, and wondering why he didn't look there first, Roderich turned his attention back to the notebook in his hand, eating his sandwich while thinking it over.

Alfred leaned over Roderich's shoulder, "Is that the list of stuff?"

"Yes. We have most of it so far…" Roderich tapped his pen at each item on the list, marking it off mentally in his head if he had the item. _'Bucket for water…I already have the tomatoes…have the cpies made thanks to the unknown source…just need arrows then?'_

"Oh I can get the arrows. Do we need bows, too?" Alfred blinked, bringing Roderich out of his thoughts.

And Antonio was brought out of his lunch, "What the heck are you guys doing?" Antonio coughed, while appearing to be choking on his soup.

"Plotting." Roderich smiled mischievously at Antonio before turning to Alfred, "Bows would be helpful, unless you know of some other way to make the arrows fly through the air." The last part was meant as sarcasm, but Alfred didn't react to it if he even noticed it. He was really…energetic all of a sudden. At least that meant he could run fast for when they were being chased. Roderich bit his lip, he was NOT looking forward to that part.

"Bow and arrows, check." Alfred smiled, "I got the key to the equipment room, still."

"Good. That will come in handy." Roderich made a little checkmark next to the line on his paper, "Hm….then…I think we're set." _'It all came together rather nicely actually.'_

"Sweet! Hey Antonio, you're gonna help us pull this off, right?" Alfred asked, with a hint of hopefulness in his voice. Roderich didn't bother looking up, as it meant probably seeing what Arthur called Alfred's puppy face.

"Uh…" Antonio looked at Alfred, hesitating, "Is this something that's going to get me in trouble?"

"That would depend." Roderich closed his notebook and set it on his lap for a moment, before shifting it back on top of the box that was sitting next to him. The box, of course, was filled with the empty balloons he had left over from the first class events.

"On what?" Antonio stared at Roderich.

Roderich didn't get the chance to answer, because Cruz was nice enough to do so for him.

"On how fast you run." Cruz sat two seats away from Roderich, giving the box a blank stare for a moment as he sat. Roderich would have moved the box, but Cruz sat down before he had a chance.

"Oh this is sounding like a heist and a half." Antonio commented, looking at his empty bowl.

'_Had he not even noticed he was done?'_ Roderich made no comment and instead finished off his sandwich.

Alfred continued happily munching on (_'probably not his first'_ Roderich thought) burger, "Dude it's gonna be awesome! You totally gotta join up with us!"

Cruz twisted open the bottle cap of his drink and gulped it down. Roderich gave him a quizzical look, "Is that all you're having? Just a drink?"

"Yeah. What about it?" Cruz returned the confused look, "Not hungry."

Roderich stared at him for a moment longer before shaking his head and turning his attention to the conversation between Antonio and Alfred.

"Yeah…but…I narrowly missed out on detention the first time I was in the office…" Antonio continued to hesitate, not that Roderich blamed him.

"Oh, look at it this way, your punishment if we get caught is going to be absolutely nothing compared to mine for putting it together in the first place." Roderich spoke up, trying to reassure Antonio. He really did look as if he wanted to join, it was just the idea of detention that was holding him back.

Antonio tapped his spoon against his plate a couple times, looking thoughtful for a moment, before agreeing, "Sure, why not. Might as well have some fun before the day is over."

Roderich smiled, "I appreciate the help. Are we all done then?" He looked back and forth between everyone's trays. _'How does Alfred eat so fast? It never ceases to amaze me.'_

"I am." Alfred smiled cheerfully.

"I guess so." Antonio finished off his drink.

"Yeah." Cruz shrugged and twisted the plastic bottle in his hands.

'_He's recycling that, right?'_ Roderich gave the empty bottle a look, "Good, then we're off to the student council room. Oh, Antonio, bring that bucket with you." Roderich motioned to the yellow bucket.

"Sure. Should I just put the stack of papers in here?" Antonio glanced inside.

"That'll work. And save me from carrying it." Roderich smiled. _'As long as it's dry. But he wouldn't put the papers in if it were wet anyhow.'_

"Then we're off!" Alfred grinned and stood up, picking up his tray.

"Off to get ourselves in major trouble…" Cruz grumbled, standing up and heading for the trash can.

"Oh what's life without a little fun in it?" Roderich followed along behind him, taking his tray and Antonio's, and carrying them on top of his box and notebook. _'He's not recycling it after all.'_

Alfred took the trays off the top of the box and dumped them into the trashcan for Roderich.

"Thank you." Roderich commented, heading for the doors.

"No problem at all! Your hands were kinda full." Alfred laughed, "What's in the box anyway?"

Roderich waited until they were outside the cafeteria, with Cruz following a step or two behind them, before answering, "Balloons."

"Yay! We get to throw water balloons?" Alfred looked even more excited than he had earlier.

"Indeed." Roderich smiled.

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Gilbert watched the monitor beside his bed, his eyes moving with the little green line that went in a steady _"beep…beep…beep…"_.

'_Oh mein GOTT. I am bored out of my mind!'_ Gilbert turned his head back towards the ceiling again, staring at the same white tiles he had been counting earlier.

Regis had left the room at some point, shortly after Gilbert yelled at him (and calling him a poor excuse of a supportive vati, but that was besides the point) and had yet to return. Gilbert's crimson eyes trailed over the tiles, continuing where he had left off (he had stopped at the tile with the stain in the center) and went on counting.

"Twenty, twenty one, twenty two, twenty three…twenty four…twenty five… twenty six…twenty seven, twenty eight and…a half…" Gilbert stopped when the tile disappeared into the wall, hesitating for a moment before counting it as half and moving onto the next row. "Twenty nine…thirty…" He smirked a bit as he found another stain in the next row of tiles. Gilbert paused and let his eyes trail to the door when he heard footsteps, but they passed by his door, and so he kept on counting. "Thirty one…thirty two…thirty three…thirty four…thirty…five." Gilbert stopped at the half-tile again but counted it as well and looked at the next row. "I wonder how many tiles I have to count before I fall asleep?" He sighed and counted the next few as well. "Thirty six…thirty seven…thirty eight…(next row) thirty nine…forty."

Again someone went by his door, but they didn't stop that time either.

"Forty one…forty two…forty three…forty four…forty five…forty six…forty seven and a half…" Gilbert sighed heavily. Forty-seven and a half tiles in his room. Gilbert gazed blankly up at them. Maybe he should count the tiles in the wall, next. He glanced over at the walls and made a face. _'I'd sooner go to sleep.'_ Gilbert sighed and went back to staring at his monitor.

"_Beep…beep…beep…"_

He half-wondered what would happen if it would suddenly start going haywire, but then again, if it did do that, it wasn't a good thing and he still wouldn't know, because he would be unconscious more than likely. Gilbert stuck his tongue out at it and stared at the door instead. Just how long would he be stuck laying here?

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><p>Yay, update all done! (at least two of the four) so leave me a review, this goes for all you ninjas and ex-ninjas out there! XD Loooong...<p> 


	19. Unexpected Help and Unawesome Mr Stiff

By the way guys: I hate to say this but, if I stop updating for a while, please don't think I gave up on the story. =w=; More than likely I wound up in the hospital. The bug I have is going around and it's what happened to my coworker's daughter because an infection set in. So I'm short one infection (thankfully) of being somewhere without internet access. Just a warning for you all. :3 Moving on to happier things~ XD

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><p>.<p>

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Roderich shifted his weight from one foot to the other. He was waiting for the bell to ring. A silver pot of tomatoes sat behind him, hidden from view. His current station was the janitor's closet. Waiting. If there was one thing he absolutely hated doing, it was waiting. Roderich sighed impatiently. He knew there was still a while until the bell would ring. At least five or ten minutes. But he couldn't risk moving the pot out now and having someone trip over it or move it, because they didn't know what it was there for. So Roderich waited.

He blinked when he felt his phone vibrate and quickly took it out, "At least I have something to do now!" He winced at the bright light from the phone screen, and dimmed it hastily. "I should have known better than to do that…oh. A text message?" Roderich opened the message. _'It couldn't be from Alfred, he's too busy. Antonio's inflating beach balls, so it isn't him…Cruz maybe?'_ He had given the Cuban his phone number while they were in the planning stage back in the student council room.

But…it was a message…from Gilbert.

_**Hey Roddy~ Thanks so much for the video, it was completely awesome! You really can have fun if you try, and you totally just made my day so much better! Completely forgot about that unawesome morning I've had so far.**_

Roderich stared blankly at the text message, "Well that clarifies a few things that I had been wondering about." Roderich tapped his foot, feeling the urge to take his frustration out on the small cellular phone, but restrained himself and instead tapped a message back.

_**And you just answered a question of mine that I've been wondering for the entirety of the day. Thank you for that.**_

Roderich put his phone away, wondering what the response would be, now well aware that he would, indeed, be getting one. "Mission for change, indeed. Mission for causing emotional heartbreak to students more like." He scowled. Now he was even more determined to pull this off without getting caught.

Roderich perked up when the bell rang, and kept an eye out on the hallway as it filled with students. Soon it would empty out again, and he could set up his plan in action, and hurry off to his next station. Hopefully no one would linger too long, he only had about a ten minute window of opportunity here.

Roderich took out his phone when it went off again:

_**Ja? Und what question was that?**_

Roderich barely resisted the urge to laugh. He could tell when Gilbert was nervous even by communicating through text messages. He tapped his response in, humming quietly and pocketed his phone once more. The hallway was emptying out already. That was fast.

Roderich raised an eyebrow, a little suspicious on why it was clearing out so rapidly. He peered out when the hallway was empty. "Strange. Works for me though." He stepped out and pulled the pot out with him, placing it behind a trashcan he had moved into this hall earlier. _'Now to get to my next position.'_ Roderich hurried around the corner and ducked behind the potted plant that was in front of the library.

From this vantage point, he could see the entire courtyard in front of him, as well as Cruz over in an adjoining hallway. Roderich smiled. This was going to get interesting. He picked up the bow he had left propped by the railing and waited. His supply of arrows was sticking out of the soil of the plant behind him, waiting to be grabbed and launched.

Two minutes…

Roderich sighed and took out his phone again, "Gilbert, why right now?" He looked at the message with a blank stare.

_**I suppose technically you could call this living.**_

Roderich raised both eyebrows before hastily typing a response. The first car was pulling up already. He motioned to Cruz to fire the first round and pocketed his phone. Roderich was rather surprised, to say the least, to see that the first arrow Cruz fired hit its target perfectly.

"He should join the archery team." Roderich smiled and watched Cruz fire a second time, this one hit the principal, "That…wasn't our target. Oh well." He watched as a second car pulled up and pulled back on the bow, "Okay school board…prepare yourselves for our 'warm' welcome…" He sent the arrow flying across and hit the female in the forehead before she even made it past the front gates.

Roderich smiled, "Perfect shot." He grabbed a second arrow and prepared to fire again. He watched as Mr. Smith seemed to be apologizing, and sent the second arrow flying at the same female target. This time she ducked however, and the arrow ended up sticking into the tire of her car. Roderich made a face. "Well. That was not my intention, now it means you have to stay here until you get a tire replacement. Hopefully she has a spare."

Roderich watched as the third car pulled up, "Carpool. More targets. Excellent." He smiled cheerfully. Cruz fired off the first arrow for this one, and Roderich watched it take the wig off of the first male to get out of the car. Roderich watched the arrow land on the ground, the wig speared underneath it, and promptly lost all composure. He burst out laughing at the sight. Roderich pulled an arrow out from behind him, and struggled to stay standing upright long enough to fire it off. He noticed his target saw the arrow, attempted to duck, but ended up failing to figure out where it was going to be landing and got hit in the shoulder anyhow. Roderich smiled, "That's what you get."

Roderich watched as Cruz fired off three arrows, hitting three committee members at once, "He really is a natural with that bow." Roderich aimed an arrow of his own and hit the same female he had hit before, though this time the arrow bounced off of her back, since she was ranting about something to the other committee members.

Roderich nodded in satisfaction seeing as how his arrows were all gone, but apparently Cruz still had one left, because he took off the wig a second time. Roderich watched as the wig and arrow went sailing into a classroom window that had been left open and burst out laughing again.

"Conference room secure! I'm headed for the hills!" Alfred called as he went sprinting by.

Roderich blinked, momentarily shocked. Those school board committee members could _really_ run! Roderich peered down the hall and spotted Antonio holding them back with his barrage of tomatoes. Seeing the Spaniard get up and start running, after flinging the silver pot, Roderich smiled and joined up with him as they ran down the hall and past the library.

"This is going to get veeeery loud." Antonio laughed.

"Indeed!" Roderich smiled cheerfully, "And hopefully our legs don't give out on us."

'_Oh is that how he did it?'_ Roderich sighed, seeing Antonio unlock the door as they ran by. Roderich saw the yellow rope hanging off the doorknob, and watched as Antonio yanked it while they were running by, setting loose a large number of beach balls.

"Success!" Antonio cheered.

"How did you fit all those in there?" Roderich stared at him, completely amazed.

Antonio's only response was a grin. Roderich shook his head and spotted Alfred catching his breath behind a trashcan, "Run Alfred!" He called.

"Roger! I had to stop and catch my breath!" Alfred responded, kicking over the trashcan before sprinting after them.

Roderich turned his head and watched Alfred run down the hall to the left, he spotted a silver pot sitting in the middle of the hall for a moment and became rather confused, "What was that doing there?" He turned his head back straight again, barely noticing Antonio running down the ramp, but he heard the clattering of the buckets falling over.

'_Well now they're both set and gone, but now I have to get out of here!'_ Roderich rounded the corner as soon as he reached it, still running as fast as he could go. His ribs were really starting to hurt from this. Roderich hurried towards the stairwell, and noticed someone had spilled soapy water all over the stairs, "Hello…is someone helping us that I don't know about?" Roderich blinked, "Wait…how am I getting down?" He ended up jumping on the banister at the last minute and slid the whole way down, "I am never living this down if I live to be a hundred…" He grumbled, flying off the end, but somehow managing to land on his feet and kept going.

Roderich dashed around the first corner he came to and kept running, there was absolutely no way he was making it to class at this rate! He spotted an open classroom door up ahead and stared at it in confusion but kept running by, or he would have, if he hadn't been yanked into the classroom. Roderich stumbled a bit as the door shut quickly behind him.

He turned and found his third bell teacher smiling at him cheerfully, "Huh?"

"Sorry~ That was way too much fun to just sit out~" The teacher clapped her hands together and smiled apologetically, "I was having fun!"

"You made the copies?" Roderich stared at her dumbfounded.

"I did~!" She continued smiling.

"…" Roderich stared at her in disbelief.

"I also left the yellow bucket by the table you always sit at during lunch, moved a table across from the conference room to help Alfred keep the school board at bay, strung a rope across the set of stairs and left a bucket of water at the top for Alfred to tip over on his way up…"

Roderich's eyes widened, "You…did all that? You could lose your job you know…"

"I'm aware of it!" She laughed, "But you had such a good reason for behaving the way you did! The teachers around here really don't take into consideration how their students feel about being taught the same boring lessons via powerpoint, so acting out is necessary!"

"Without a doubt you are the first teacher to ever comment on that." Roderich straightened up a bit, finally catching his breath, "Thank you Miss Summers."

"Oh! And I also left the pot of tomatoes in the second hallway that Alfred ran down!" Miss Summers smiled cheerfully.

"I was wondering about that. Then…you were outside the student council room when we were talking?" Roderich blinked.

"I was!" Miss Summers smiled, "And it was such an excellent idea~!"

"Up til now." Roderich frowned, hearing shouts in the hallway getting closer.

"Shhhh…" Miss Summers switched off the lights and dragged Roderich to the back corner of the room.

Roderich huffed but crouched next to her, "If they look in here, I'm not responsible for this position."

"Yes yes." Miss Summers laughed.

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Gilbert hummed quietly to himself, watching the monitor continue its green line that kept spiking up. That was supposed to be a good thing, it meant his heart was beating. At least that's what the nurse had said who came in here. Gilbert looked around the room. _'Vati still hasn't come back…'_ Gilbert rolled his eyes and looked up at the ceiling. "…can't count tiles…already know how many there are." He sighed and looked back at the monitor.

Regis came in not a minute later. He wandered over to the chair he had vacated earlier and sat down.

It didn't take long at all for the silence to settle between them again. Gilbert mentally rolled his eyes again and continued watching the green line bounce up and down. It was rather funny to think that green line would keep going on for ever…even if Gilbert suddenly died, that green line would just keep going, only it would be in a straight line.

'_That green line needs to get a life of its own. Seriously. Maybe it can transfer to one of the computers…'_ Gilbert realized how ridiculous that thought was and sighed heavily. _'Green lines don't have a life. It's a line, du dummkopf.'_ Gilbert turned his head and saw Regis was looking up at the ceiling.

"Forty seven and a half." Gilbert said flatly, realizing his Vati was counting the tiles.

"That bored?" Regis asked, still looking up at the ceiling.

"Ja. Nothing to do when you're stuck laying on a bed, hooked up to a little tiny monitor with a green line that keeps going 'beep beep beep'." Gilbert commented dryly. He took out his phone when he felt it going off and looked at the message. "…"

"Oh? Is that your friend you were texting earlier?" Regis looked at the phone as well.

"…I'm not sure if I wanna look at this…" Gilbert opened the message anyhow.

_**And you just answered a question of mine that I've been wondering for the entirety of the day. Thank you for that.**_

"Way to go." Regis commented.

Gilbert stuck his tongue out at him, "He didn't say what question!" Gilbert texted Roderich back and huffed, "Geez."

"Ja…und how long have you been texting him?"

"…since…this morning…" Gilbert felt his face grow hot.

"Mhm…" Regis just nodded his head and stared at the wall opposite of where he was sitting.

"Shut up." Gilbert grumbled, flipping open his phone at the message that went off.

_**I have been wondering for the entire morning if you were actually alive or not. The principal made a rather stupid mistake when talking to me that made me wonder.**_

Gilbert stuck his tongue out at Regis again, "It wasn't even me that made him wonder. So there."

Regis just raised both eyebrows.

Gilbert texted back to Roderich again. _**I suppose technically you could call this living.**_ He picked up the remote that controlled his bed and glared at it. How were any of these stupid arrows supposed to make sense? One triangle going up, one triangle going down, then there were two more sets just like it! He pressed the first one and found the headrest moving up, "Oh. That's what that one does…" He pressed the second one and the whole bed moved up, "Well then." He moved it back down again.

"Are you having fun?" Regis asked, staring at him with a blank expression.

"Ja. What little fun I can have." Gilbert pressed the third up button and found his feet rising, "Well. That makes sense." He put the foot of the bed back down again. Gilbert continued raising the head of the bed upwards until he was sitting up at a slight incline, "Yay."

"I think you were supposed to stay laying down." Regis commented.

"This is laying down. This is laying down with my head up." Gilbert retorted, and looked at his phone to see what response he got from Roderich.

…_**what was that supposed to even mean?**_

Gilbert glared at his vati as he put the bed back down where it had started from, headrest included, and typed his response out: _**It means I'm stuck with someone totally unawesome who won't even let me sit up. Oh. Und I'm stuck in the hospital. Completely unawesome company in a completely unawesome hospital. I miss that crap emotional facility. That place was better than this.**_ He sent the text message and laid the phone down with the screen still up.

Regis leaned over and read the message displayed on the screen, "…unawesome…"

"Ja. That would be you." Gilbert closed his eyes and smirked.

"I figured that out since I was the only one in the room." Regis commented dryly.

Gilbert just stuck his tongue out.

"Your face will freeze like that one day." Regis grumbled.

"Oh good. Then every time we see each other, you'll know what I'm thinking." Gilbert laughed.

Regis sighed heavily, "Your sense of humor is certainly different from Ludwig's."

"I wasn't aware he had one." Gilbert scoffed, "Mr. Unawesome Stiff who can't even smile."

Regis raised both eyebrows, "Ludwig smiles."

"I have not seen him smile _once._" Gilbert grumbled, "Wait." He paused, "I take that back. He smiles when he's around the ditzy little Italian."

"Ditzy…" Regis blinked.

"Ja. Feli is a ditzy idiot." Gilbert waved a hand around nonchalantly.

"Ach, Feliciano. Ludwig's brought him over to the house once or twice." Regis smiled lightly, "He does come across as bit…spacey."

"Ditzy, spacey, same thing." Gilbert commented, "Either way, Mr. Unawesome Stiff only smiles around him."

"…Mr. Unawesome Stiff…if that's your nickname for Ludwig, then what is mine?" Regis looked at Gilbert.

"Mr. Grown-Up-Unawesome-Stiff-Who-Won't-Let-Me-Sit-Up." Gilbert grumbled.

"…" Regis just stared at him.

"You asked." Gilbert stuck his tongue out at him again.

"I know that. The doctor doesn't want you sitting up. Deal with it." Regis grumbled.

"I am. By calling you an unawesome stiff who won't let me sit up." Gilbert laughed.

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><p>Thus the end of the chapter be :D Leave me a review~! ...longest. Chapter. Ever.<p> 


	20. Here we sit and Unawesomer Mr Stiff

8D Thank you for all the wonderful reviews~ And I was so happy to see the return of my faithful review, Procella~ *heart* 8D And so I continue on with my next chapter *because I really don't have anything else to say. XD *

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><p>.<p>

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Roderich frowned while leaning at the back of the classroom. He was staring at his phone for some time now. Trying to make sense of the last text message Gilbert had sent him. Okay so obviously the letter he had written was, in fact, true that he had an illness of some sort. That would explain being in the hospital. But…he was alright…right? That's why his father was there?

Miss Summers was just humming to herself. They were still sitting in the dark. Still waiting for people to stop going by the door so they could escape the room without being detected.

Roderich looked at the blinking message icon at the top of his phone. It had been there for a couple minutes now, but he was still trying to figure out how to respond to Gilbert's text. Clearly he was not feeling like himself at all. He sighed and finally typed in the only response he could come up with. And that was sure to make the other start laughing. Roderich shook his head and opened up the waiting message. _'From Cruz? I hope he got away all right…oh.' __**One of you all can come up with a plan to get me out of this bathroom later. I'm staying put for now. Had a way too close call already.**_

That complicated things a bit. The frown remained on Roderich's face while he tried to think of some way to get Cruz, Miss Summers, and himself out of the predicament they were in. Alfred and Antonio couldn't help, obviously, they were already in class. Even if it was study hall, they couldn't just up and leave when they were late getting there to begin with.

"_Attention students."_

Roderich looked up at the speaker system, startled. "Well that's a rather abrupt way of doing this."

Miss Summers laughed, though Roderich could hear the nervousness in her voice, "I guess they can't limit it down to a grade, so they can't call an assembly…there's not enough seats."

Roderich nodded in agreement.

"_Obviously we have some practical jokesters in this school building."_

Roderich rolled his eyes and went back to staring at his phone. He owed Cruz a response, that much was certain. How was the tall Cuban even hiding in the bathroom to begin with? Wouldn't they have searched the stalls? Unless they didn't bother looking… Roderich shook his head. Think of something. He chided himself and glared at the message again.

"_As of noon, most of you would recognize this time as the start of your fifth class, there were several students NOT in class."_

"Oh they figured out it was more than one student…" Miss Summers whispered.

"That's because we all split up and ran in different directions." Roderich commented dryly, "In an attempt to escape without getting caught. Which leaves three of us in a rather tight situation."

"Three?" Miss Summers peered at his phone.

"Classmate is hiding in the bathroom, how I have no idea." Roderich sighed.

"More power to him." Miss Summers laughed.

"_As of noon, the school board showed up in front of the school. And promptly got a welcome from several of the students. By means of bow and arrow."_

"Oh it's not like they were real arrows, morons." Roderich grumbled, "Geez. The way they're going on about this you'd think we actually hurt someone."

Miss Summers laughed, "And of course there were measures taken to not let that happen!"

"Of course. The only thing hurt was their pride. Which they've taken to a whole new level obviously." Roderich glared up at the speaker that was mounted on the wall.

"_One of these arrows did damage to a car that was parked out front of the building. And upon entering the building, the school board members, as well as the principal, discovered that the front lobby had been completely covered in water and soap."_

Roderich couldn't suppress the smile, "She's the one who ducked. Serves her right."

Miss Summers laughed again, "As long as she had a spare tire, what's the big deal about that? Are they going to make you change her tire?"

"She can change her own tire." Roderich huffed, "I'm not doing her work for her."

"_When attempting to give chase to the hooli-student responsible for this, we had buckets of water poured down the stairs, fell down the stairs, had a bucket kicked down the stairs at us, had tomatoes thrown at us, had beach balls come flying out of nowhere…"_

"I'm relatively certain the speaker wanted to say hooligans right then." Miss Summers whispered.

"I'm positive that's what he wanted to say." Roderich gave up on responding and dropped the phone next to him. Gilbert hadn't responded yet anyhow.

"_Had more tomatoes thrown at us, and when pursuing a student down a ramp, slipped on water and slid the whole way down and across the floor!"_

Miss Summers rubbed the back of her head nervously, "That was my fault…"

"No worries. You were only attempting to help us." Roderich waved his hand carelessly, "If anything I'm the one going to be in serious trouble if they ever find out I was plotting this entire thing."

"_And now, that we have been searching the halls to discover them to be completely empty…"_

Miss Summers and Roderich both stared up at the speakers, dumbfounded.

"Well what did you expect?" Roderich snapped.

"Should you all have just stayed standing in the hallway and went…ta-da or something?" Miss Summers asked.

"I'm not going ta-da. And anyone who does so needs to be slapped upside the back of the head." Roderich grumbled.

"_We are giving the students behind this act exactly TEN MINUTES. To get to the office."_

Roderich hastily picked up his phone again and started tapping in a message to send to Alfred, Antonio, and Cruz. Not that Cruz would have left the bathroom anyway, but just to be on the safe side.

"_If no one comes in ten minutes, then punishment will follow to all students found to have participated in this little charade!"_

*click*

"Well. Do they really think anyone is going to respond to that?" Miss Summers asked quietly.

"They have nothing on us. There's no security cameras in this school, they couldn't possibly tell who we were at the distance we stayed away from them." Roderich crossed his arms and scowled. He felt a bit more relieved when he got the responses from Alfred and Antonio.

_**No problem. Staying put in study hall. **_–Alfred

_**Roger. Hopefully you two are hiding out okay, sorry to hear about the predicament you're in, Cruz. I wish we could come and help, but we're stuck in study hall! D:**_ -Antonio

Well that was that then. As long as everyone stayed quiet, then no one would get in trouble. Roderich smiled. This plan ended up going perfectly after all! Roderich leaned back up against the wall, and continued to wait out as time went by, "Do you think they'll make another announcement in ten minutes?"

"Hard to say…" Miss Summers looked thoughtful on the matter, "They might, but they also might not, just to see if anyone comes down late."

"Hmm…" Roderich let his gaze wander around the otherwise empty classroom.

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Gilbert glared at the doctor who was standing by his bed, and had been for a little while now, holding the small clipboard. He had just been standing there, looking at the paper, and making soft hmm-ing noise for the past ten minutes now. Was he going to say something or was he going to keep standing there making noises? Because the noises were rather irritating. And of course his vati had left the room, surprise surprise.

"So, Gilbert, you've been living with this for the past…year now?" The doctor asked, not looking up from the clipboard.

"No. And if that's what that thing says, it's lying. I've been living with it for the past ten months. There's a difference." Gilbert smirked, "If it was a year, I wouldn't be laying here, and I wouldn't be having this stupid conversation."

"Alright, ten months then. How are you feeling with physical activities, do they wear you out at all?" He just ignored Gilbert's sarcasm, how rude.

"I wouldn't know, I don't participate in gym class." Gilbert half-glared at the doctor.

"You don't? Did your family doctor write a note?"

"No." Gilbert said flatly, "I don't participate because I don't want to. And because the principal hates me."

"…" His doctor made a face in response, "Well then. What about in stressful situations?"

"What stressful situation?" Gilbert raised both eyebrows, "If you don't let anything bother you, then nothing is stressful~"

"That is a very carefree way of looking at life."

"Ja. Und unless something happen that proves otherwise, it's a motto to live by." Gilbert turned his gaze back up towards the ceiling. Same ceiling. Same number of tiles. _'For the next two months.'_

"Well then, I can't really see how we're going to notice a difference here." He looked over the clipboard, "There is a slight chance it's going to be rejected…"

Gilbert just stared at the doctor. _'What the hell is he going on about?' _A minute passed of silence between the two of them before Gilbert made the mental connection. _'Oh is that why Vati left the room so fast?'_ Gilbert looked at the clipboard the doctor was holding. He had seen his vati just outside the door a minute ago, "Hey hey."

"Hm?" The doctor blinked at him.

"Can I borrow that a sec?" Gilbert pointed to the clipboard, grinning widely, "Please?"

"Sure, but what are you going to use it for?" The doctor handed it to him, confused.

"How far do you think I can throw this thing?" The smile didn't waver.

"Huh?" The doctor stared at him, even more confused, "Throw?"

"Ja. Think I can hit the idiot outside my door?" Gilbert held up the clipboard.

"Ah…don't throw that at someone…" The doctor made a futile attempt to get the clipboard but Gilbert had already flung it.

Gilbert's doctor turned nervously towards the door as he heard german curse words outside in the hall, "…"

"Hm. I can throw it that far after all~" Gilbert smiled cheerfully, "Danke."

"…" His doctor slowly turned his head back towards Gilbert, "…"

Gilbert continued smiling. At least until he heard his phone go off. "Hm? Message from Roddy~" Gilbert picked up his phone and opened the message: _**Hospital? Are you alright?**_

Gilbert looked at the message for a few minutes before responding: _**Ja, totally. Just threw a clipboard out the door and hit the unawesome-stiff-who-can't-even-listen-when-someone-tells-him-something in the head. Awesome aim, ja? :)**_

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><p>=w=; And thus ended the …short chapter. Eh wasn't that short after all. Leave me a review anyway~<p> 


	21. Still sitting and Oh the fun I will have

Prepare for texting in this chapter because Roderich is still hiding and Gilbert is still stuck in the hospital. And there's only so many other things you can say. XD And in response to some reviews: Yes it's okay that Roderich knows Gilbert is alive (as well as the other three), he would have figured it out eventually anyway. And this story is almost over anyhow. Sorry to say. Also. Going to skip back and forth. Sorry again. XD And also, short chapter is short. Sorry.

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><p>.<p>

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Roderich stared at the last text message he had gotten from Gilbert. He threw a clipboard…at who? He raised an eyebrow and asked Gilbert who he was talking about before laying his phone on his lap once more. He was half-expecting an announcement to come over the speaker system, but none came. "I hope Alfred wasn't stupid enough to go to the office." He sighed.

"He said he was staying in class though, didn't he?" Miss Summers looked at him.

"Yes. But this is Alfred. Hopefully Antonio kept him there." Roderich sighed and looked at his phone as he got a response, "Hm?"

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Gilbert glared at his phone, opening random menus just to close them again. Anything to keep him from talking to the stupid-idiot-otherwise-known-as-Vati sitting next to him. Gilbert perked up a bit when he got a text message and opened it. _**Who on earth are you calling an unawesome stiff?**_

Gilbert smirked a bit and raised his cell phone so the camera was pointing at the only other person in the room (the doctor having left some time ago) and took a picture. He attached it to the text message and sent it off again.

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_**Unawesome stiff. Looks like Little Stiff doesn't he?**_ Roderich stared at the picture that was attached to the text message, "Is little stiff supposed to be Ludwig? Isn't Ludwig taller than…" He made a face and didn't finish the sentence, due to Miss Summers still sitting next to him. He sighed and shook his head before returning another message. He didn't even know why he was bothering to text Gilbert, but if the normally hyperactive person was stuck in a hospital bed, then he might as well do something to keep the other entertained, right? And besides, it wasn't like Roderich himself could go anywhere either.

"How long until that stupid bell rings?" Roderich asked.

"Uhm, another ten minutes or so." Miss Summers tried to lean forwards, "I can't see the clock from here."

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_**Isn't Ludwig taller than you? Calling him Little Stiff seems a bit strange.**_ Gilbert stuck his tongue out at the phone as if Roderich could see him before responding again.

"Why isn't whoever you're texting in class right now?" Regis asked, breaking the silence rather suddenly.

"How the heck should I know? Here I'll ask him for you. Happy?" Gilbert glared at him before returning his attention to the phone.

"Ecstatic." Regis said, quite sarcastically.

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_**He's smaller than this dummkopf, so he's a Little Stiff. And Big Stiff wants to know why you're not in class.**_ Roderich couldn't help but laugh at the text message. Gilbert was definitely not on good terms with this other person. He smiled and returned a message, hoping that the texts going back and forth were doing something for Gilbert, if only a little bit. He leaned back up against the wall and sighed. Roderich looked at a chair across from him, and wondered for a moment if it would be safe to go sit in a chair instead of on the floor.

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_**I was shooting arrows at the school board. I'm hiding. Apparently I ruined a perfectly good car tire, too, judging by the announcement. You have better aim than me it would seem.**_ Gilbert burst out laughing. Regis looked over at him with raised eyebrows. He happily sent a message in response before remembering it was the Unawesome-Stiff's question and showed the message to Regis, "There's your answer." Gilbert stuck his tongue out at his vati.

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_**Roddy~ you're gonna use what little fun you had in your personality all in one day! Und I'm not even around to see it! I want pictures! Video would be even better, like that last one you sent, that was awesome.**_ Roderich smiled. The first sentence was a little annoying, but he could ignore it for now. He would just have to get Gilbert back at some point for that. He tapped his phone on his leg, trying to figure out how to respond again before sending the first thing he could think of. He actually had been wondering for some time now anyway.

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"Ja, so I see." Regis raised an eyebrow, "Shot arrows…"

_**When are you coming back?**_ Gilbert made a face in response to the text message he had just gotten. Good question, no answer. Gilbert rubbed the back of his head, "Huh…" He tilted his head slightly. How was he supposed to respond to that? Gilbert sighed but sent back the less-than-helpful response, it was the only one he could come up with.

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_**Honestly? No clue.**_ Roderich frowned. So much for that. He sighed and hit his head against the wall. He was slightly hoping that Gilbert and the others would be able to return to school soon, but maybe that was too much to hope for. What was this stupid mission for change anyway? The proposal for it had been less than informative. _'And I'm out of things to say…'_ Roderich sighed. What more was there to say?

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Gilbert stared up at the ceiling, really not expecting any answer from Roderich after the last text. The conversation had been pretty much over anyhow.

"Okay, Mr. Gilbert…" The doctor from earlier came back in, carrying his clipboard again.

Gilbert eyed the clipboard. _'Probably wouldn't let me borrow it this time.'_

"You and your other three classmates will be returning to school tomorrow, we just got word of that." The doctor smiled pleasantly over the top of his clipboard.

Gilbert stared at the doctor with a blank expression. Seriously. Right after he told Roderich he didn't know when they would be going back?

"The four of you will be speaking at an assembly tomorrow morning, just so you're aware." The doctor added, "And I believe your ride will be here shortly to give you a lift home."

"…" Gilbert watched as the doctor left the room, "Speak at an assembly…the principal is actually going to let me near the microphone? Oh the fun I will have~"

Regis winced, "At least keep with the mood of the assembly, I wonder what ride they're arranging?"

"No clue. As long as it's not the unawesome hearse I got to the facility in, I don't care." Gilbert grumbled, "Speaking of which, how did you get here?"

"…with the ambulance you got here in." Regis made a face.

"Oh joys. I get to ride with you." Gilbert rolled his eyes, "Oh the fun I will have." If he had another pillow he would be pressing his face into it right now.

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><p>Yay! I got the last chapter update done before going to bed today! 8D Sorry this one was a little on the short side,leave me a review anyway!<p> 


	22. BlankFaced Stiff

Okay, let's see if I can get all of these posted today~ :D *hoping*

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><p>.<p>

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Gilbert glared at the hearse from the, completely and totally unawesome by the way, wheelchair he was sitting in. Do all patients have to sit in these things when they're being taken out of the hospital? Because it made him feel really stupid. Gilbert glared up at the blonde male pushing from behind. That or it was _this person_ making him feel stupid. "I could totally walk right now."

"Ja, I'm aware of that. But deal with it anyway." The response was rather short-tempered. Apparently he hadn't cared for any of the conversation they had been having so far. Not that Gilbert was really caring much for it either.

"Only proves I was right all along." Gilbert muttered.

"Right about what?" Regis blinked down at him.

"Nothing." Gilbert said flatly. _'Und now I'm thinking out loud to myself. Terrific.'_ Gilbert ignored the stare he was now getting and waited for the doors to open to the hearse. He was supposed to ride in that thing? Again? Seriously the first time was funny, since the teacher had originally told him ambulance, but the second time?

Gilbert raised an eyebrow as the back doors were opened, "Oh, I get a casket this time? How fun."

"Ah…is he supposed to ride in that?" Regis asked, blankly staring at the driver.

"Just for appearance's sake, yes." The driver said, Gilbert was assuming that was meant as an apology, "Are you a relative?"

Gilbert made a scoffing sound.

"Whether he likes it or not." Regis responded, blatantly ignoring the noise Gilbert made.

"N-O-T." Gilbert spelled out, glaring at his Vati.

"That was a rhetorical statement. I already knew the answer." Regis responded, returning the glare, "I was _attempting_ to spare the driver."

"He has to drive us both somewhere doesn't he? Might as well give him a warning now." Gilbert snapped.

"…" The driver, now a slightly paler shade than he had been before, quietly looked into the back of the hearse and back to Gilbert, "Uh…so you want to climb on in then?"

"Dunno. Am I allowed to climb in by myself?" Gilbert asked, keeping an innocent expression on his face, though the comment was directed as a jab towards the one behind him.

"Mr. Sarcastic is going to get dumped in it shortly." Regis responded.

"Oh gee how nice. I think the doctor with the clipboard would object to that." Gilbert grumbled, but slowly stood up and stepped away from the wheelchair. Apparently there was still some after-effect of whatever they used, because he found himself getting dizzy from standing upright. Terrific. Not about to admit _that_ either.

"I'm sure he objected to his clipboard being used as an object for hitting someone with." Regis retorted, pushing off the wheelchair to the nurse (also slightly pale and apparently pretending to not be listening) who was standing by the curb waiting.

"I asked him if I could borrow it. Not my fault he didn't ask what for." Gilbert turned his head to glare at Regis before turning back around again.

By now, the driver had, rather quickly apparently, escaped back to the driver's side door. This was going to be a fun car ride, especially since Gilbert couldn't even see straight enough to make it any further than two steps away from where the wheelchair had been.

"It's not like the casket has a lid." Regis commented, misinterpreting why Gilbert had been glued to one spot on the pavement.

"Dunno. Kinda wishing it did." Gilbert responded automatically, "At least then there'd be a slight chance of suffocating."

Gilbert winced as he promptly got a sharp smack on the back of his head. _'He's mean! Und that so didn't help! Dizzy enough already, danke!'_

"I swear if you mention one more time you'd rather be deceased, I'm dragging you back to that emotional craphole, as you put it, and making sure you learn something the second time around." Regis growled.

Gilbert stuck his tongue out in response, "Oh gee, how nice of you~" Clearly meant to be sarcastic, but his sight wasn't the only thing failing him at the moment. His voice had cracked slightly.

"Whatever." Regis sighed heavily. _'Und he better not be thinking he upset me with that comment. The only problem I had with that place is that failure of a counselor he called Roma, the inedible food, and the beds.'_ Gilbert glared but attempted to go another step towards the hearse. He made it, sort of.

Okay, so "sort of" ended up translating to losing his balance, and falling flat on the arm that went out to support him upon the other person seeing he was falling over. Unfortunately, with the driver inside the hearse, and the nurse with the wheelchair long gone, it meant the only person who possibly could have caught him was Vati. _'Something else I am never going to live down.'_

"You might have mentioned you were having problems." Regis commented dryly.

"Why would I do that? That would completely be unlike me." Gilbert responded, not even bothering to attempt to regain his sense of balance, "While you're holding me up though, can you at least push me into the back of the hearse?" If it was any other situation, this would be hilarious. Heck if it was happening to someone else, he'd be rolling on the ground laughing, but no. It had to be this dumb situation he was in, and it had to be himself it was happening to.

Regis sighed (again) and what Gilbert assumed to be his version of pushing (obviously their definitions vary), because he ended up picking Gilbert up off the ground completely and setting him in the back of the hearse.

"I said _push._ Not _pick up._" Gilbert glared at Regis.

"Deal with it." Regis glared in response, "Can you manage getting into that…thing?" He motioned to the casket.

"It's a casket." Gilbert raised an eyebrow, "Und yes. I can manage that. How hard is it to fall over the side of one of these things?" Gilbert crawled up to the side of the casket.

"Don't fall into it. And I am well aware what it's called, it just seems weird to be asking someone if they can climb into a casket." Regis said, through gritted teeth by the sounds of it.

Gilbert shot a glare in his direction, "It's a prop, obviously."_ 'I hope.'_ Gilbert propped himself up on the side with his arms and half-lifted himself off the floor of the hearse. _'Ja. Totally not working. No arm strength.'_ He ended up giving up and laying on the floor instead, "How about if I just lay here?"

Regis made what sounded like a snort and climbed into the back of the hearse, slamming the doors behind him, "You are hopeless."

"I don't recall you being told you were riding back here." Gilbert grumbled.

"Ja, well you obviously don't like being picked up, there's not enough room to pick you up anyhow, so that means you're laying on the floor of a moving vehicle. So here I sit." Regis responded, moving so he was sitting next to Gilbert.

"Oh the fun I will have…" Gilbert muttered, repeating himself from earlier.

"You two might want to hold on back there then. This could get bumpy." The driver called, before pulling out of the hospital parking lot.

"Ja, danke." Regis looked towards the driver.

"So long as bumpy doesn't mean I'm ending up in Mr. Stiff's lap." Gilbert retorted from the floor.

"…" The driver remained silent after that.

"Ignore Mr. Sarcastic. We're fine." Regis smiled.

"Mr. Stiff and Mr. Sarcastic, gee, you can really tell we're related." Gilbert grumbled.

"Where are we going anyway?" Regis asked, clapping a hand over Gilbert's mouth, "Und keep your mouth shut before you insult someone."

"If you have to say that, I think I already accomplished it." Gilbert muttered through his hand, tempted to bite it.

"To another hospital." The driver laughed nervously, "Closer to the school, but they'll be staying overnight there and then going to school in the morning."

"…" Regis tilted his head slightly. Impossible to tell what Mr. Blank Face was thinking. Oh.

"Mr. Blank-Faced Stiff…" Gilbert's eyes lit up slightly, even though his mouth was still (lightly) covered with the hand belonging to said nickname…which promptly earned himself another smack on the head.

Regis's face had turned slightly red after that comment, "Gilbert. Shut up before I get beyond annoyed."

"You're not beyond annoyed yet?" Gilbert was rather amazed actually. After the entire morning they've had, he hadn't gotten past annoyed yet? Gilbert was way past annoyed.

Regis glared at him in response, but didn't say anything.

'_Ja. He's totally past annoyed.'_ Gilbert rolled his eyes and shifted his gaze to the side of the casket. _'Hm…probably a good thing then that the transfusion was already done. At least he can't refuse doing it now.'_

Gilbert cursed slightly as they hit a bump in the road and he ended up hitting his back against the person sitting next to him, but thankfully not hard enough that he had gone airborne enough to land in said person's lap. That would just be way unawesome. Which pretty much summed up his day. Except for the text messages from Roderich, those were awesome.

Regis shifted his hand so it wasn't covering Gilbert's mouth anymore, and instead laid his arm over Gilbert, presumably keeping him on the floor so he wouldn't bounce around. Gilbert half-glanced at him, but he appeared to be lost in thought, thinking about what, Gilbert was almost positive he did _not_ want to find out.

"Here we are!" The driver called, though from the relief in his voice, it was rather obvious he had not wanted to spend any more time in this car than absolutely necessary with the two in the back.

"Alright, oh there's two of you, hello! I need Mr. Gilbert…"

"Mr. Sarcastic." Gilbert corrected.

"Ignore him." Regis smiled, hitting him on the head again.

"…Mr. …Gilbert…I need you to get on the gurney please…" The nurse faltered a bit after that.

"Ja, ja." Gilbert sat up and moved onto the gurney before his mind could process that he was moving and make him dizzy again. Not repeating the getting picked up. That was bad enough the first time. He stared at the side of the building, away from Mr. Blank-Faced-Stiff and waited while he was being strapped down. As if the feelings of unawesome hadn't still been there from the wheelchair, now it was being multiplied. Thankfully he was covered with the white sheet, which meant his view was obstructed.

'_No blank-faced stiff staring at me~!'_ Gilbert sighed in relief as he felt himself being pushed through a set of doors and down a long hallway. She was taking her time, for some reason she seemed slightly out of breath, as if she had just been running.

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><p>Time skip of about five minutes or so~<p>

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><p>Gilbert heard muffled voices upon entering the room, but whatever conversation that had been going on had stopped when the nurse entered. He waited until he felt the gurney stopping and the straps being removed before shifting slightly. Finally.<p>

"Here you are. You can move over to the bed now." The nurse smiled cheerfully, pulling the sheet off.

"Oh gee, may I?" Gilbert crawled onto the bed, and under the blankets, "Thanks. You didn't have to bring the Stiff in with you though." Though Gilbert did notice that Regis wasn't directly behind her. He must have stopped at some point to talk to someone.

"He was accompanying you though…we had to give him a ride as well…" The nurse faltered a bit. _'That wasn't what I was referring to.'_

"Ja, ja. Whatever." Gilbert waved a hand carelessly and scowled as she left the room, taking the gurney with her, "Hello people~" He smiled cheerfully at Matthew and Lovino, who he assumed the voices belonged to that he heard, it would make sense since they were the only ones in the room anyway, "Hey where's Arthur at?" Gilbert glanced over at the empty bed across from him.

"Not here yet. He might be giving the ambulance crew a hard time." Lovino responded, and raised an eyebrow at Gilbert, "Who were you calling stiff?"

"Him." Gilbert motioned at the door as Regis wandered into the room. _'Nein. It was so nice without the blue stare of no emotion…go away…oh. That was a nice name to call him, too.'_

"…Eh." Matthew whispered, watching Regis. For some reason Gilbert got the impression Matthew had either met him before, or seen him from somewhere before, because the blonde didn't look at all surprised to see who it was.

"So where the heck is Arthur at?" Lovino scowled, "Geez. Oh yeah, what'd you ride here in Gilbert?" Lovino looked back over at him again.

'_His mind just skips all over the place. Those two were not related were they?'_ "A hearse." Gilbert rolled his eyes, "Complete with casket." _'Not that I was in it.'_ Gilbert's gaze followed Regis as he crossed the room and sat on an empty chair next to Gilbert's bed, "…" Crimson gaze met the blue gaze for a moment and they both glared at each other.

"You weren't the only one after all." Lovino spoke to Matthew, who started laughing.

"Eh, I guess not! That's a relief! Those things aren't comfortable at all." Matthew smiled. _'He actually rode in the casket? More power to him.'_

"So what are we doing at this assembly tomorrow, just showing up?" Gilbert asked, turning his head away from Regis.

Lovino made a face, "I'd be happier _not_ showing up."

"I think we'd be in trouble if we didn't…" Matthew sighed.

Lovino glanced at the door as another gurney was pushed in. _'Oh it's the same nurse. She must have been running with whoever the person before me was…Lovino has tv remote, so Mattie.'_ Gilbert raised an eyebrow at Matthew, wondering what the rush was about.

"Arthur Kirkland I presume." Lovino said.

"Oh do shut up." Definitely Arthur.

"Und a jolly hello to you too." Gilbert laughed.

Gilbert watched as Arthur moved onto the bed, noticing he took his time in settling himself down and covering himself with the blanket. He looked rather pale. _'Did something happen with his ride maybe?'_

"So…I take it…you two are related after all?" Lovino asked, causing Gilbert to turn his head slowly towards Lovino asking, of course, about the one subject that he didn't want to talk about.

Gilbert glared in response, "He's a bigger stiff than Ludwig."

"Excuse me…" Regis spoke up, glaring at Gilbert in . So beyond annoyed.

"You're excused, by all means, leave." Gilbert motioned to the doorm, waving at it with both hands, "Shoo."

Obviously the glare he was getting in response, meant that was not the excusing that Regis had been referring to. Pity.

"Oh. By the way, Gilbert."

"Hm?" Gilbert glanced over at Lovino. He was certainly talkative today.

"Grandpa says hi~" Lovino forced a smile, "He was that stupid counselor you were complaining about?"

"Oh, ja, Roma? That's your grandpa?" Gilbert burst out laughing, "He reminded me so much of your ditzy brother, too!" _'Ahahaha, what goes around comes around!'_

"Ditzy…" Lovino blinked, "Feli is ditzy?"

"Well what else would you call him?" Gilbert stared at him blankly. _'Is there a better word to describe him?'_

"Eh…" Matthew looked over at Arthur, "It feels kind of strange to think we're going back to school tomorrow…"

Lovino grabbed his pillow and pressed it to his face, "I don't want to speak at an assembly damn it!"

"Ja. And suffocating yourself is going to do what exactly?" Gilbert remarked. He had forgotten for the moment, actually since he was pushed out of the hospital in that stupid wheelchair and the events that followed, that they were supposed to be speaking tomorrow morning.

Lovino scoffed through the pillow but didn't respond, right away. He ended up throwing his pillow towards the foot of his bed. "What are we even supposed to say tomorrow?"

"Ta-da?" Gilbert raised his hands partway. _'Still totally want to see everyone's faces if we do that.'_

"I will buy you lunch if you do that." Arthur said flatly.

"Deal!" Gilbert grinned, "Totally going to now!" Sweet~

Regis just sighed and shook his head. Gilbert glared at his vati, silently telling him to keep his mouth shut. Regis returned the glare, again.

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><p>So…there's father-son bonding here if you reeeeeeeeeeeeeally squint. And have binoculars, because it really just looked like it got worse. XD Leave me a review! And awesome style was the longest chapter...by like 1000 words. geez. XD<p> 


	23. Reunion: TADA!

Anime/Manga » Hetalia - Axis Powers » **Life with Lyrics AWESOME Style**

Author: yellow blaze

Rated: T - English - Friendship/Romance - Reviews: 126 - Published: 01-28-12 - Updated: 04-04-12

id:7781850

So not one person noticed what I thought at least one would in the last chapter. XD Oh well~ This will be the last chapter, so I feel obligated to go a little easier on his dad in this one. (if you read the other fics before this, you will know that is a lie. XD ) I love you all! :D

Procella, Youjustgotiggyrolled, ScienceWolf, UK's Only, Ellenthefox, SpiritOfTheMapleLeaf, Oceanfur, Fekete (and all you other names I can't remember at the moment)... you guys are awesome. You kept reviewing over and over. Thank you. :3

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><p>.<p>

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Gilbert looked over his wall scroll, looking in amazement at how many signatures there were (surprisingly a few teachers had even signed). Gilbert smirked, clearly they missed his awesome self after he was gone~ He perked up when he found a signature he recognized as being Antonio's.

_**Gilbert- What the heck. You were sick all along? All those times I asked you if you were sick, you answered no, and you really were? Clearly we can add 'liar' to your school record. I was worried about you! Oh man…this is like a screwed up nightmare. If you guys really are gone, can you hug Lovi for me? Thank you…I miss you already! I need someone to cheer me up!**_

"Ja, well so what if I was sick? Emphasis on _was._" Gilbert rolled his eyes slightly, "Stupid vati. Not like I was gonna tell people here at school I was that sick. That would have just been pathetic." He continued looking over the scroll, smiling when he found a signature from Resident Hero, also known as Alfred.

_**Gilbert- Dude you really were awesome. That letter really lightened the mood there, thanks. I wonder if you knew about the others? Well I guess you do now, huh? I hope you hit them all over the head. That was just like you to make the principal read something like that!**_

Gilbert grinned. He wished he could have seen the principal struggling to read that. That must have been completely hilarious! Taken out of context of course. In context, not so hilarious. Gilbert shook his head and continued looking over the scroll. He saw Feliciano's (and was a little shocked to see there was one).

_**Ve, Gilbert you're really fun to be around. You're seriously sick? I know the secret already, so there really isn't much to say here…but it's gonna be really quiet!**_

Ach, so Lovino's parents did tell Feliciano. That would make sense. The over-emotional Italian would have had a fit if he thought his twin brother had committed suicide. Gilbert spotted the neat handwriting next to it and just about gagged.

_**I know we didn't talk much, but I felt obligated to write something. It's going to be…quiet in class now that you're not there. I don't think the teachers are going to know what to do without the constant distractions. –Ludwig**_

"Little stiff." Gilbert stuck his tongue out at the paper before noticing something in pen written next to it, "Huh? Why switch to pen?"

_**Und Vati just told me you're my older (somehow twin) brother. That's just great. You were here the whole time. You und mutti.**_

Gilbert grinned. Apparently Big Stiff had told him at some point, and the pen indicated it was a different day than the first note was. Gilbert sank back in his chair. He had found Roderich's first, and smirked at the (very) neat handwriting.

_**Gilbert- You always had such an energetic personality. I never would have guessed you were in pain. I know we hardly ever spoke but…you're going to be missed around here. It's going to be much quieter. And a little boring.**_

Hardly ever spoke, HA. You wish. Gilbert smirked. He had always made it a point in his daily routine to stop by the student council room and harass Roderich for a couple minutes before continuing on his merry way. "I am going to have so much fun when I see Roddy again~" Gilbert grinned, before remembering he was (unfortunately) also going to be seeing Little Stiff (and more than likely Big Stiff) again as well. "Shit." Gilbert buried his face in his hands, "I don't wannaaaaaa…so unawesome."

"Gilbert. I want to start the assembly soon." Mr. Smith peered into the room, "Hm? Are you okay?"

"Yo, unawesome principal person, don't start with me." Gilbert looked up and scowled at him before standing up and dragging the scroll with him, "I feel perfectly fine~"

"Don't call me that." Mr. Smith glared at him before leading him to the back area of the stage, "Now stand here, don't break anything, and I will be back with the others." He glared at Gilbert as a warning and stalked out of the room, but not before giving Gilbert one last look (and it looked more like one of concern, which Gilbert promptly stuck his tongue out at him for).

Gilbert laid his wall scroll on the table and wandered around the room before stopping at a spot where he could see the stage and (some of the) audience. No sign of anyone he knew yet, at least not on that side. He ran a hand through his silver hair and let out a sigh of frustration. Yesterday had been completely and totally UNAWESOME. The last thing he had wanted to do in that emotional craphole was see Vati, and of course that happened. And then he had to go and need taken to the hospital (no clue what happened there), and then even more crap, get told the procedure was done while he was floating in memory lane. Stupid vati does not listen.

"Seriously?" Gilbert grumbled, "The last thing I wanted was _that_. Because now I feel like crap whenever I look at him…" Gilbert sighed heavily and hung his head. He glanced up to see the principal coming in (and promptly got another look of concern, at which Gilbert lifted his head and pretended nothing was wrong).

Lovino wandered into the room after the principal, and Mr. Smith left the room again (once again giving Gilbert a look, hereby getting himself ignored again). Gilbert stood in one spot, bouncing on his heels every now and then. Clearly yesterday was not cool. So he had to make today a better one to forget what happened. No problemo~ except he probably had to go home with Little Stiff. Gilbert winced inwardly. Why does that side of the family have to be so completely …stiff. Seriously, can they loosen up a bit? Just a little?

Gilbert glanced over when Mr. Smith showed Arthur in and left again (this time he didn't get a look, yay~). Arthur was looking as calm as ever, except the scowl was on his face for some reason, and Lovino was looking like…a nervous wreck, and that was putting it nicely. Gilbert looked away again. Okay so obviously he had to find some way of apologizing to vati for the way he behaved yesterday. That would at least be the nice thing to do. Somehow. Probably work it into his speech or something.

Mr. Smith came back in with Matthew in tow and looked at the three of them (was it his imagination, or did his gaze rest on Gilbert the longest?) before shaking his head, and went to head for the stage. Mr. Smith started to head for the stage, "Alright. Let me go out there and start this off. Oh." Mr. Smith turned back towards them for a moment, and Gilbert caught the Don't-You-Even-Think-About-It look on his face for a moment, "And NO wisecracks. Remember these people thought you were dead."

Mr. Smith turned away from them again and walked out onto the stage towards the microphone. How rude. Like he was even going to think about it. Things like that don't even need to be thought about~

"I can't believe we're back here…" Gilbert whispered, speaking up only to break the uneasy silence that had been settling over the room, "So unawesome…"

"Well, all it'll take from you is another prank to get suspended right?" Arthur asked rather calmly.

"Pft. Whatever." Gilbert waved a hand dismissively at Arthur. No need to get your student council nerves tied up in a bunch already!

Matthew peered around the curtain, leaning over slightly so he could see better, "I wonder how this is going to go…what are we saying?" He glanced back in their direction. Gilbert hadn't even thought about it further than finding some way of putting an apology in as well.

"No clue." Arthur sighed. Gilbert noticed he was looking at Lovino and followed his gaze to the (now shaking) Italian.

"Eh…" Matthew whispered.

"Cheer up man. You're not alone." Gilbert grinned and clapped a hand on Lovino's shoulder.

"I-I don't want t-to speak…" Lovino whispered through gritted teeth, "Damn it…"

'_Whoa. He really is a basket case!'_ Gilbert looked at Lovino, wondering if he was even going to be okay.

Arthur shook his head, "Then who is going first?"

"Rock-paper-scissors?" Gilbert asked, holding up a closed fist hopefully.

"No. I am not going first." Arthur spoke up (_'Well why didn't you just say that when you asked who was going first?'_) "And obviously Lovino isn't."

'_That would leave two of us left.'_ Gilbert looked over at Matthew.

"Eh I guess it's me. Gilbert should be the comic relief at the end with his Ta-da." Matthew laughed quietly.

"Sweet!" Gilbert pumped his fist into the air, completely excited now, "You all are gonna let me do it~"

"Fine, then I'll go second. Lovino are you going to be okay third?" Arthur looked over at Lovino again.

"Sure. I'll figure out something to say by then…" Lovino shrugged.

Gilbert stood with his head tilted slightly. A silence had settled over them again. He could faintly hear the principal tapping on the microphone, performing the soundcheck. Gilbert closed his eyes and listened to the faint noise of those in the audience talking. If he imagined it hard enough, he could put himself out there, too, and not back here, about to give a totally unawesome (and unplanned) speech.

.

.

Roderich sat in the fourth seat from the center of the row. He didn't mind the seating arrangement, since he was sitting next to Antonio. He got along with Antonio fine, of course he really didn't have any problems with Alfred or Cruz either. But just as well to have someone quiet next to him, even if the person on his right was anything but. Roderich gave a disapproving look out of the corner of his eye to the student (he honestly had no clue who it was) on his right. He leaned slightly towards Antonio, just trying to get away from the annoying voice in his ear.

"Students…family members. Once again I call you down here. I am sure the assembly is still fresh in your minds from the other day. The one that took four of your classmates away from you, and today, we are gathered here for that same reason." Mr. Smith looked around the room in front of him.

"Not again." Cruz grumbled, "Don't tell me someone else did this."

Roderich felt as if his stomach had dropped. He knew already what the other three didn't, that their friends were alive (thanks to the principal and Gilbert), but hopefully someone didn't actually go do something like that…but…the principal didn't seem overly upset or anything. So it had to be something on a good note. Hopefully. In the meantime, this person can get off his damn phone and SHUT UP.

"Dude. If someone else did this, I will scream." Alfred spoke up, "Literally."

"That would almost be worth hearing." Antonio muttered.

Roderich was only half-listening to their conversation, as the voice in his ear was getting louder by the minute (at least by his standards). Who talks on their phone during an assembly anyway? That's just rude!

"Today is the day after, two of you know as the greatest prank ever to pull on this school. For me, it is the day after the most ridiculous prank ever to be pulled on this school." Mr. Smith said, the annoyance showing quite visibly in his voice and face.

"Two of you…" Roderich said quietly. He turned his head to the left to look at the three sitting near him, "So which of you decided to play hero?" He put an emphasis on the last word, knowing full well Alfred would have been one of the ones to skip to the office. Cruz couldn't possibly have if he was in the bathroom hiding. So that left Antonio. And that made sense since they were both in the same class.

"Not me. I was stuck in the bathroom." Cruz said instantly, but he looked over towards Roderich when responding at least.

Roderich looked at Antonio with a I-Know-It-Was-You look on his face. "His idea." Antonio automatically pointed at Alfred, "Not mine. I was protesting the whole way."

"Totally saved your school records!" Alfred grinned.

"Thanks. A lot." Cruz grumbled, "Not like it could have possibly gotten any worse."

"Idiots." Roderich shook his head in annoyance. Well obviously they didn't get suspended or expelled, so perhaps they were the best choice for taking the fall. Roderich rubbed his forehead in annoyance, as the person next to him prattled on to whoever was on the other end of the phone line.

"But this prank was one of the most well-thought out that I have ever seen. Yesterday I had seven people down in my office, including a teacher, for acting out during class. Yesterday, I had seven reasons to believe that finally something happened in this school that promoted a positive change." Mr. Smith smiled a bit, one of the only times Roderich had _ever_ seen him smile, and turned his head to look at the different sections of seats in the auditorium, "And so, today, we have four guest speakers to talk to all of you." Mr. Smith looked offstage to his right.

"Four?" Alfred whispered, "We have to sit through four speakers? How many classes do you think we're going to miss here?"

"Who knows." Roderich sighed. _'They're back? Gilbert said he didn't know when he was coming back!'_ He could feel the hope rising slightly in his chest, of course, that could also be frustration, due to the same annoying person he's had to deal with this entire time (and it only just started).

"Who cares." Cruz grumbled. _'Depends on the speakers. I might rather be in class.'_ Roderich thought, sighing slightly, still leaning towards Antonio.

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.

"If the first speaker would come out…" Mr. Smith called over to them.

Gilbert leaned forward and watched as Matthew panicked slightly before starting forward. "Wah…" Matthew whimpered, "Butterflies in my stomach."

"Good luck!" Gilbert called quietly.

Gilbert didn't care that he hadn't gotten a response. Thought that counts, and Matthew probably didn't hear him over the sound of the metaphorical butterflies. He smirked when he saw Matthew was staying in the dark to prevent being seen by any member of the audience.

"Oh he's cheating." Gilbert started laughing.

"No one said we had to remain _in sight." _Arthur commented. This was true. Gilbert watched as the principal and Matthew had a brief exchange of words before Mr. Smith went back to the microphone.

"Fine then. Apparently I'm moving the microphone." Mr. Smith spoke into the mic again, "One moment." He picked up the mic stand and walked back to where Matthew was standing, near the back of the stage, and put the microphone stand in front of him, "This speaker, is one who attended this school before, and wishes to speak out against the everyday behavior he noticed while being here."

Gilbert tilted his head. The best part about going last, he got the most time to make up a speech in his head (and also listen to everyone else's to get ideas). He leaned to the left a bit, looking out over the crowd again. _'I think I see vati.'_ He spotted someone with long blonde hair at any rate. And there was someone with silver hair sitting next to the first person, so chances are it was them.

Matthew was silent for a bit before speaking into the microphone, "Um…so Mr. Smith said why I was here, and to tell you the truth, I'm beginning to realize that maybe over the last couple days while I was thinking about this, that maybe I was the one misunderstanding what other people were trying to do…"

Gilbert raised his eyebrows in shock. Really? Mattie learned something at that emotional craphole? Gilbert still hadn't thought of a single thing he had learned there!

"But at the time, I felt as though it was the most difficult thing that I would face. Getting up for school was not something I looked forward to every morning. It was something I dreaded. I absolutely detest gym class, because for some reason we can't play touch-tackle instead of full-out-push-the-other-person's-face-in-the-mud-tackle." Matthew continued talking.

Gilbert noticed Mr. Smith walking away, and realized (by squinting) that he was laughing.

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Roderich let out a soft laugh in response to that. He couldn't help but remember the plea that had gone to student council asking them to ban tackle-football. Seems this person might have been the same one who had sent that in.

His gaze shifted to the right again. Still on the phone.

"When is he going to shut up?" Antonio asked, leaning over to whisper.

"No idea." Roderich responded, assuming Antonio was talking about the person to his right. He had no clue who else Antonio would be talking about, because Alfred and Cruz weren't saying anything (at least not that he heard over the buzzing in his ear).

.

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"Going to every class in the hallway by myself, and getting knocked into like we're playing bumper cars. Seriously, you all can slow down a bit…" Matthew sighed.

Gilbert laughed. _'So just hit them back even harder! Or get your bodyguard to hit them. I'm sure he'd be glad to whether you wanted to or not.'_ Gilbert smirked at the thought of Cruz hitting someone who had run into Matthew, it had happened before, more than likely would happen again.

"Just stay over there why don't you?" Matthew called to the principal. Gilbert raised his eyebrows as Mr. Smith walked away laughing again. Mattie was getting an attitude towards that guy too! This year was gonna be fun!

"But while I was thinking about everything I didn't like about school…I also remembered what I did like about it. I loved seeing my friends every day. I enjoyed talking to them, and the school lunches, despite the complaints, they could be much, much worse. You could be somewhere else and drink an entire bottle of gravy under the mistaken belief it's fruit juice." Matthew, at this point, leaned forward to look in their direction.

Gilbert promptly burst out laughing. He actually said it, I didn't even think about it!

Arthur gaped at Matthew, "That was gravy? Are you kidding me?"

Lovino's jaw dropped in response.

"You…" Arthur raised his hand to hit Gilbert over the head, upon noticing that Gilbert was laughing so hard, "You stupid git!"

Gilbert put his arms above his head to prevent the slap from reaching his head, not really wanting a repeat of yesterday, "I can't believe he said that~" Gilbert laughed, "Mattie is awesome!"

Arthur scowled and turned to the stage again, dropping his hand without hitting Gilbert, "I don't believe this."

Lovino scowled at Gilbert, and he promptly started his laughing fit again.

.

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Roderich leaned on the armrest in between himself and Antonio, his right hand covering his ear so he could block out (at least some of it) the conversation still going on in the seat to his right. He was very tempted to take the phone and throw it as hard as he could. But somehow he could just see that was going to get him into a fight, and there really was no place to go to avoid getting hit.

"What?" Alfred gaped, "What kind of horrible place was this?"

"Oh my word. A bottle of gravy?" Antonio shuddered, "UGH!"

"That sounds like the lunches are an unspeakable horror." Roderich commented, rubbing at his forehead again. He could feel a headache coming on. Stupid idiot.

"This person sounds really familiar." Cruz stated flatly.

"Oh? Do you know who it is?" Roderich asked, leaning forward to look over at Cruz, thankful for the distraction. _'It wouldn't surprise me if he knew who it was.'_

"Yeah and if it is who I think it is, I am going to KILL THEM." Cruz scowled.

Roderich smiled and sat back again. He knew who it was.

"Bad Cruz is back." Alfred laughed.

"Shut up." Cruz hit Alfred over the back of the head.

"Ow!" Alfred yelped, "That hurt!"

Roderich sighed heavily, though not at the slap Alfred had just received. More like at the same person to his right, who was now laughing about something he had done last night (Roderich really was trying not to listen into the conversation, but he couldn't exactly help it at this point, the voice was getting louder).

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"So the lunches here really aren't all that much to complain about. They're edible at least. It's something to look forward to when you all get up in the morning." Matthew continued on.

"Was the food that bad?" Mr. Smith asked.

Gilbert smirked in response. The bottle of gravy mistaken as fruit juice wasn't enough of an indication?

"Well I know there is certainly a member of the audience who would have been outraged at what they called a hamburger." Matthew responded. He leaned forward again.

Gilbert snickered as Arthur doubled over laughing.

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.

"Okay, how do you mess up a hamburger, really?" Alfred protested, "I want to see this!"

"No, I'm pretty sure you don't." Antonio cut him off, "If they're saying someone would be outraged at seeing this thing, then it's probably a good thing you don't know where this place is, or the atrocity of the meals they're serving."

Roderich sighed in annoyance once more. Clearly he did not need to know whatever was going on in this person's personal life. He could swear he kept seeing Antonio turn his head and glare in his direction as well, but everytime he looked Antonio was looking front. Roderich shook his head slightly. Must be his imagination playing tricks on him.

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"Ja, I'm sure people will know who we are, quite obvious." Gilbert smirked.

"Oh, great. So he's going to know who it is before I even hit the stage." Lovino scoffed (Gilbert knew full well who Lovino was talking about and smirked), "That just helps the nervousness a bit. Thanks."

"No problem~" Gilbert laughed, causing Lovino to glare at him. Hey, he wasn't so nervous about the speech now right? As long as he focused on something else!

"That sounds appetizing." Mr. Smith commented in response to Matthew.

"Imagine eating it." Matthew responded, "Anyway…there were some things coming to school that I didn't even realize I was looking forward to until I realized I couldn't come here any more. Even though the teachers have a monotone voice when they're talking…eh…no offense…"

"The teachers back at the other facility are even worse…"Arthur grumbled.

'_Ja, they are.'_ Gilbert nodded as well.

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"Hey Roderich, duck." Antonio motioned for him to bend over a bit.

Roderich looked at him confused but tilted his head forward, he reddened upon realizing Antonio had grabbed the wrist of the person sitting next to him.

"Shut the heck up! What is your problem? Do you really think the rest of us want to hear what you did last night?" Antonio hissed angrily, trying hard to not disturb anyone else sitting around them.

Roderich straightened back up as Antonio released the person's wrist with a final warning of "Hang up and shut up" to the other person. He struggled to refrain from laughing, but it really was getting close.

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"They really were putting us at their best interest, and trying to teach in a way they thought we would learn the subjects…even though we're never going to use it again. Unless we become a teacher of course. But that's a little redundant." Matthew looked over again as Mr. Smith walked away laughing again, "Seriously, just stay over there."

Gilbert started laughing. Matthew was starting to lose his temper towards the principal!

Matthew let out an audible sight at the point, but kept talking, "But I didn't realize all of this then. I only saw what was upsetting me, and I didn't have the courage or strength to go to the guidance office, or to talk to my best friend about it. So I kept quiet. And that was probably the worst mistake I will ever make in my entire life."

"Hey, he's doing a really good job with this." Gilbert commented, "Seriously." He's got a lot of emotion in his speech while he's talking.

"Yeah he is." Arthur agreed, "And he's covering most of the things we had to talk about, so that'll just make our speeches shorter."

"Thank you." Lovino whispered.

"I know the assembly you all had on teenage suicide was hard to sit through. The speaker wasn't very…considerate about how he was talking. And there really wasn't much else to be done except react on it, and…everyone did just that. We all react differently to different situations. That's how I got where I was at for the past…almost a week."

Gilbert tilted his head. It was almost a week since that assembly? Seriously? Whatever~ Gilbert made a face. Clearly an unawesome five days had passed since then.

"Maybe it was my fault for overreacting, but looking back at what I realized the past week…I wouldn't change anything if I had the chance to. Because this is probably the only way I would have learned what I have."

Gilbert smiled, recognizing it as the end of the speech before he even saw Matthew hand the principal the microphone. _'Good speech, Mattie.'_

"Next speaker?" Mr. Smith called.

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Roderich frowned. The person to his right was (once again) talking on his phone, acting as if the threat from Antonio hadn't even been given. Apparently Antonio had noticed because he was glaring again. Roderich sighed heavily. Maybe sitting here was not smart.

.

.

Gilbert watched as Arthur made his way over to where the principal and Matthew were waiting. He couldn't suppress the grin or the laugh that followed Arthur's starting comment though, "Thank you for telling me about the gravy _after_ I drank it. I was sick because of that."

"No problem~" Matthew smiled.

Arthur looked out towards the seats in front of him before speaking again, "Well the first speaker pretty much summarized what we all have been thinking the past few days. But seeing as how we're forced to speak…" Arthur glanced back at the principal at this point before turning front again, "Here we all have to stand, and you all have to sit there through this. My sincerest apologies."

.

.

"At least someone's apologizing for it." Roderich commented, "A speaker with manners. What a novel concept."

Beside him Antonio was making a face. Whether it was the speaker on the stage, or the non-stop annoying speaker to his right, Roderich couldn't tell. But he was about to ask Antonio to switch seats with him.

"Yeah anyway." Alfred laughed, "How nice!"

.

.

"I'm sure most of you would rather be in class right now. Some of you would rather be at home sleeping." Arthur continued on, "And after listening to basically the same startup to a speech five days ago, I have to admit, I would much rather be here than anywhere else. And if anyone here ever has to take an emotional aptitude test, LIE." Arthur snapped, "Don't answer that thing honestly."

"Don't listen to that." Mr. Smith cut in, rather hastily, "I will take that soon."

Gilbert smirked. He was threatening to take the microphone already? This should be amusing when he got out there!

"You would be doing me a favor." Arthur responded before proceeding, "So, the first speaker said it, where we were at was much worse than here I guarantee it. Though I notice you left out the wonderful sleeping arrangements." Arthur looked back over his shoulder at where Matthew was.

"That only qualifies if someone was actually sleeping." Matthew responded.

"This is true." Arthur turned around again, "Apparently I'm the only one who got any sleep." Arthur shrugged.

"That's because you _were_ the only one who got sleep!" Gilbert snapped.

Lovino nodded, "Yeah. Because someone above me kept tossing and turning and shaking the whole damn thing."

"I know. Vati was laying beneath me in the room at one point. I felt it move when he did. Thank you for reminding me of that unpleasant memory." Gilbert grumbled. Ugh. Had almost forgotten about that too.

"My _sincerest_ apologies." Lovino retorted.

'_Like I can't tell you're being sarcastic.'_ Gilbert glared at him before returning his attention to the stage.

"But he was right. There are so many things at this school to look forward to, aside from gym class, I share his opinion on that. And the hallways, some people really do need to slow down, it's a school not a bloody racetrack." Arthur added.

Gilbert leaned over, "Did he just shudder?" He could have sworn he saw the normally calm Englishman have a slight look of panic on his face, and he definitely saw him shake slightly.

"You saw it too." Lovino agreed, nodding, "I think I saw him look out at someone in the audience. Maybe he saw someone?"

"Maybe he saw his brothers." Gilbert snickered. That would explain the look of panic~

"I pity him if he did." Lovino forced a smile, "I'm just going to focus on the WALL when I'm out there."

Gilbert started laughing. He would bet anyone (but there was no one else back here to bet with) that Lovino would look around and find Antonio before looking at the wall.

"But the reason I stopped coming to this school, I realized, it wasn't worth getting myself depressed over. It's just one person out of countless more in the world, and as much as I do NOT want to admit it, my family is there, whether I like it or not." Arthur sighed.

Gilbert watched as it became Matthew's turn to walk away laughing.

Arthur must have heard the laugh, because he turned and snapped at Matthew, "Like you should be laughing over there. You have the most over protective brother I have ever met in my life."

Gilbert shook his head, the smile still on his face. There was no way Cruz and Alfred didn't know who these two were. And Roderich probably knew as soon as the principal started talking at the beginning of this thing.

"So I'm rather glad I got the opportunity to attend somewhere else. There were classes there that opened my eyes, one in particular, but I refuse to comment on it. I'm still rejecting half the things they said." Arthur grumbled, "And I also discovered that there are people in this school…who will contact someone by phone. No matter what time it is, no matter what the situation, they will call your cell phone. And they will leave a voicemail message that's over five minutes long."

Gilbert burst out laughing and had to walk away before the principal heard his loud laughter. _'Oh mein gott, Alfred actually called his phone! I thought Roddy was the only one who did that!'_

.

.

Roderich watched as Alfred's face turned dark red and he sank in his seat.

"Do you know who this speaker is?" Cruz leaned over the armrest in between them.

"Oh shut up." Alfred sank lower in his seat.

Antonio sighed and patted Alfred comfortingly on the back.

Roderich shook his head (for what felt like the twentieth time that day) and looked back forward again. Except for the person (still) sitting to his right was now talking to _him._

"Hey dude."

"My name is not dude." Roderich glared at the male, "What?"

"You got the time or something?"

"Why don't you look at your phone that you've been on this entire time?" Roderich forced the kindest smile that he could at the present time.

"I'd have to hang up to do that!"

"Oh the horror." Roderich leaned on the armrest in between himself and Antonio and looked back up at the stage.

"You're rather rude, aren't you?" The person snapped.

"Clearly you haven't been listening to yourself talking for the last goodness-knows-how-long. You're the rude one talking on the phone during an assembly!" Roderich snapped, though he was attempting to keep his voice down, unlike the other guy.

Roderich raised both eyebrows as the other person flicked him off with the middle finger before going back to his phone conversation and distinctly heard "rude son of a…" in the conversation now. Roderich looked back forward again.

"Would you like me to throw the phone?" Antonio asked, smiling cheerfully.

Roderich jumped slightly, not expecting Antonio to have been leaning in this direction, "No. I'm not starting a fight."

"It'd be me starting the fight." Antonio grinned, "Please?"

"No. Just ignore it." Roderich said flatly.

.

.

Arthur shook his head and lifted his head to look at the audience once more, "But. I will thank that person anyway. Because without that voicemail, I wouldn't have realized the few things that I did." Arthur turned and held the microphone to the principal.

Gilbert grinned as Lovino started making his way out along the back of the stage, and raised an eyebrow as Matthew took the microphone instead, "Do not anger him when there's a yardstick within grabbing distance. He knows how to use one." Matthew said flatly.

Gilbert started laughing again. Today was going to be awesome! Up until the point of giving a speech and seeing vati later. The in-between moments would be awesome~

"Thank you for that." Arthur hit Matthew over the head and handed the mic to the principal, scowling at Matthew.

"Not even going to ask. Third speaker?" Mr. Smith sighed.

Lovino grabbed the mic from the principal and glared out at the audience, "Okay, so I don't have much to say in addition to the first two who spoke up." (Gilbert raised his eyebrows at the fast-paced speech. At least you could still understand what he was saying) "But I will say, thanks to a relative who I can see already" Lovino sighed (Gilbert started laughing again. _'Even the counselor failure is here!'_), "…that I am, unfortunately, grateful for the class he was teaching yesterday. Despite it being annoyingly long, I did learn something out of it, besides insults that I could use against him. The way you all reacted to that assembly, none of you did anything wrong."

Gilbert smiled, and leaned slightly, watching as Lovino (who used to be a nervous wreck, now he didn't seem nervous at all except for the fast-talking) gave his (more than likely short) speech.

"I know some of you were laughing, and it really did make it sound like you were laughing at those who were suffering from depression, but you weren't. And I realize that now." Lovino sighed, he had spotted where Antonio was sitting and saw him instantly react to what he had said, "You all react the way you were taught to. Some of you laugh off situations that would otherwise make you feel uncomfortable or down…and that's fine. There's nothing wrong with that. Just…let people know around you that you're not laughing at them. Otherwise there's going to be someone out there that's going to blow it entirely out of proportion. Much like I did.".

.

.

Roderich smiled as Antonio started bouncing in his seat slightly. It hadn't taken him all that long. He probably realized who it was as soon as Lovino started speaking.

.

.

"The situation was what it was…none of you did anything wrong in responding to it. The speaker really did fail at some points in explaining, and that is why we're up here." Lovino looked back at where Matthew and Arthur were standing, "But at least we made some new friends out of this." He smiled slightly at seeing them both nod in agreement.

"Have fun with the next speaker." Lovino said flatly, and handed off the mic to the principal.

Gilbert grinned and skipped across the stage and stood next to the principal, grinning wildly.

"Of course he would be last." The principal (obviously) forced a smile, "Last speaker…don't make me regret this."

"Ja, ja. Whatever. Gimme." Gilbert smirked and held out his hand for the microphone. _'You are SO going to regret this.'_

"I mean it." Mr. Smith growled and handed Gilbert the microphone before stepping back next to Lovino.

"Boy. Some people are stiff." Gilbert scoffed at the principal, who glared a warning at him. Gilbert grinned and held the microphone up. He turned front again, "Ja, so we got to spend our time in the most boring place imaginable. I don't think I learned a single thing by attending any of the classes. And I certainly didn't learn anything at the lunch, though I know two other people learned how to read." Gilbert looked back at Arthur and Lovino, grinning knowingly at them.

Arthur and Lovino both glared at him, while Matthew laughed beside Arthur.

"I shall call you the gravy-drinker duo." Gilbert smirked at Arthur and Lovino and turned back to the audience, "But ja, despite all complaints about the totally inedible food, the annoying person who completely FAILED at being a counselor, I learned something anyway~"

Gilbert had seen Roma sitting to the left of Regis and smirked at the "HOW RUDE!" he got in response from the now-pouting (supposed) adult.

"I didn't even say it was you, shut up." Gilbert stuck his tongue out at Roma (even though the adult couldn't see him).

"Oh my word." Mr. Smith slapped the palm of his hand to his forehead, "I knew I was going to regret this."

Gilbert glared back at the principal, "You wanted us to speak. Be careful what you wish for." He looked back and held the microphone up again.

"Clearly a mistake on my part." The principal sighed heavily.

Gilbert turned his head to stick his tongue out at the principal before continuing on, "Ja, so really I didn't learn a single thing from that crap place we were at, other than there are totally three awesome people I've never spoken to at school behind me now~" Gilbert flashed a grin back at Arthur, Matthew and Lovino before looking front again, "And those beds suck there, but that's besides the point."

.

.

Roderich listened, with eyebrows raised, as (obviously) Gilbert continued talking. He couldn't see the person talking, but it was most definitely him. No one else could annoy the principal that fast, or talk in the manner that he was.

.

.

"Two nights ago was it? The night we didn't get any sleep whatsoever anyway. Ja, we had the most wonderful wake-up call, und I mean totally rude wake-up call when I say that. The most unappealing breakfast I have ever seen, I think the only thing edible was the sausage, the eggs probably were never from a bird at any point during their fake substitute lifetime." Gilbert scoffed and continued talking.

"Und after breakfast, as if it wasn't already downhill enough, I see you rolling your eyes, Mr. Stiff. You know what's coming." Gilbert called over to his father. Gilbert had seen the look on his vati's face as soon as he had started talking about the wake-up call, "I get a call to go to a conference room that I have absolutely no clue where it's at. And of course the hall monitor insisted on taking me down there herself, I don't know why, she could have just given me directions. Und for the first time in sixteen-completely-blissful-nothing-wrong-with-them years, I got to meet my huge stiff of a dad."

Gilbert stuck his tongue out at Regis, who was scowling at the stage.

"I see you glaring by the way. Apparently that half of the family doesn't know how to have fun. Big Stiff und Little Stiff, and so help me if I hear that comment about Little Stiff being taller than me again." Gilbert grumbled, glaring in the direction of Roderich, who he had spotted upon coming out on the stage.

.

.

"Hm. I think that was directed at me." Roderich commented, maintaining his calm temperament (somehow).

"Is this for real?" Alfred asked.

"If it is, I'm running for the stage door after this." Antonio grumbled.

Roderich unconsciously shifted towards the armrest again, leaning on it slightly, just to get away from the laughter (if only by an inch or so) that was in his right ear at the moment. He raised an eyebrow at Antonio who was sticking his tongue out at Roderich._ 'What is he doing that for?'_

Roderich glanced down as Antonio looked forward again and realized the armrest he was leaning on, was in fact, not the arm rest. It was Antonio's arm. Roderich moved slightly and straightened back up again, pretending not to see the strange look on Antonio's face when the Spanish male looked in his direction.

.

.

"And despite all thoughts of absolutely not wanting to see the guy, I have to admit, it was _slightly_ nice to know that he had been looking for us all along. Even if I already knew that from overhearing a conversation in the hallway at school. Don't look so shocked, mutti." Gilbert waved a hand nonchalantly at the jawdropped-look that was on his mutti's face, "And despite the sarcastic conversation we had going back and forth, including some thoughts where I wanted to him with my metaphorical shovel…"

Gilbert grinned as Regis yelled "HOW RUDE!" much like Roma had a little bit ago.

"Same to you." Gilbert retorted, "Anyway despite all that, it was nice to actually hold a conversation with him. And get the permanent look of shock off your face or I _will_ hit you with something physical." Gilbert snapped.

That look was not shock, Gilbert knew it quite well. But old habits die hard, and there was no way he was letting that look of slight genuine caring stay on that otherwise blank slate of a face.

"Und Big Stiff obviously doesn't listen to anything someone says, because despite my saying NO, loud and clear, und that I liked my life just the way it was, I still wake up in a hospital several hours later." Gilbert continued talking, ignoring the look he was now getting, "So thanks to the completely unawesome-blank-faced-stiff-with-no-emotion-whatsoever, turns out I'm not going to be leaving this place early after all."

Gilbert glanced over and saw the expression had changed to the one he had been getting all day the day before. "That's the face I was talking about." Gilbert started laughing, pointing over to him, "Much better. Anyway, I'm done now." He looked back at the principal, grinning.

Gilbert blinked, startled, when Matthew took the remote, blushing a bit, "Eh. One last thing…"

"I know there are quite a few people who realized who we are already, mostly from accents I'm sure." Matthew looked back rather pointedly at Arthur and Gilbert.

Gilbert stuck his tongue out at him. _'As if they didn't know already!'_

"Mine included." Matthew added softly and turned back front, "But, for those of you who haven't realized it yet…" He sighed and stepped forward a couple paces (_'Mattie has nerve!'_) , "Four days ago I faked my own death in the Mission for Change, my name is Matthew Williams." He looked back at the others, now standing in full light. Gilbert could have laughed at the pleading look on Matthew's face.

Arthur stepped forward, taking the microphone from Matthew, "My name is Arthur Kirkland, I committed suicide for the Mission for Change." He held the microphone behind his right shoulder for Lovino.

Lovino stepped forwards, grabbing the mic , "Four stupidly-long-days-ago, I committed suicide for the mission for change. Lovino Vargas." He handed the microphone off to Gilbert, scowling once again. Gilbert bounced forward and grinned while he took the microphone.

"Ja, My name is Gilbert Beilschmidt, I pretended to die an early death in the Mission for Change." Gilbert looked back at the principal who was nodding. He seemed quite solemn for the occasion. I can change that. Gilbert held up the mic, smirked at the principal before looking forward again grinning wildly once more, "But we are back again, TA-DA~" He raised both hands over his head in a mock cheer.

"How did I guess you were going to say something like that." Mr. Smith stepped forward and grabbed the microphone from Gilbert, glaring at him.

"You know me too well~" Gilbert laughed, "You're totally buying my lunch now, right?" He looked over at Arthur, hopeful.

"Yes, yes." Arthur nodded. Gilbert couldn't help but notice that a look of panic had crossed his face momentarily before he disappeared after Matthew and Lovino.

Gilbert grinned at the principal, who was still scowling at him, "Ta-da?" He waved with his hands before turning on his heel and waltzing across the stage. Gilbert bounced into the backstage room and grinned, catching what Arthur had said.

"I can't believe that!" Arthur had started laughing, "You actually said it!"

"Ja, of course." Gilbert smirked, "Principal doesn't like me already~" _'Serves him right for looking at me with those eyes…'_ Gilbert clenched one hand slightly but released it again right away. No one is feeling sorry for the awesome me~ I am perfectly fine! Gilbert picked up his wall scroll and smiled. He stepped away from the table and grinned at the other three in the room.

Lovino sighed in quiet relief, "It's over…"

"Eh. We still have to make it through school today." Matthew looked over at Lovino.

"Damn it." Lovino grumbled.

Matthew stepped out into the hallway with a sigh.

Gilbert wandered out and smirked at Matthew (he had heard the surprised yelp that had come from Matthew before he wandered out), seeing he was now in a tight hold by Cruz, "Und, how did that work out for you?"

"Oh shut up." Matthew blushed.

"Hm? Why don't you want to…" Arthur wandered out the doorway and into the hall. "OH FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!"

"IGGY~" Alfred cheered, now tightly holding onto Arthur.

"FOUR." Arthur got an arm free and hit Alfred four times over the head, "DO NOT CALL ME THAT! AND I AM NOT CUTE DAMN IT!" Arthur growled, as he could feel his face burning in even more embarrassment.

"Owwww~ You were seriously keeping track!" Alfred cried.

"Eh…Lovino…" Matthew started.

"Hm?" Lovino looked over before promptly getting tackled by Antonio, "GET OFF OF ME!" Lovino yelled, his face turning bright red.

Gilbert smirked and spotted Roderich coming down the hallway, "Roddy~" He happily skipped up the hall and met Roderich halfway (more like three-quarters of the way).

"And you're back. Despite saying yesterday you didn't know when." Roderich said flatly, half-glaring up at Gilbert.

"Ja, und, I didn't at the time you asked me. Would you believe not five minutes later the doctor came in and told me I was coming back today?" Gilbert grinned.

Roderich shook his head with a sigh, "Honestly. You could have texted me that. It would have been nice having something to look forward to."

"Aw~ did Roddy miss me?" Gilbert laughed.

A slight brush crept across Roderich's face, "S-slightly." He looked away, "It was quiet in class without you there."

"Ja, und I'm sure it was quiet in the council room too, you didn't have the awesome me to keep you from falling asleep at your boring paperwork~" Gilbert couldn't resist teasing him.

"I got my work done, thank you." Roderich huffed, "And now at least I can go back to behaving like myself, now that I have a mark on my school record."

"The water balloons were awesome!" Gilbert started laughing, "It totally cheered me up yesterday!"

"I find it hard to believe you were having a bad day." Roderich commented, watching as Antonio and Lovino ran by (with Lovino chasing Antonio).

"Ja, well, I was. A really bad one." Gilbert sighed, "Stupid vati."

"But you can live now, right?" Roderich asked, tilting his head slightly, "I'm assuming that's what you meant when you said that."

"Ja. As long as I don't reject it or whatever." Gilbert waved a hand around, "Because apparently there's a slight chance of that. But if it happens, it happens. No big deal."

"No big deal for who?" Roderich glared at him, "Then we have to go through this all over again."

"Ja…except…then no amount of water balloons is going to get me to answer my phone then." Gilbert pointed out flatly.

Roderich made a face, "So don't reject it."

"You know I can't really control that, right?" Gilbert raised an eyebrow.

"Yes, yes." Roderich sighed.

Gilbert watched as Alfred went running by, dragging Arthur along behind him, "…Well then. Those two are off at the speed of light…"

"Or the speed of hero at any rate." Roderich agreed, watching them disappear up the stairs that were located half-way through the hall.

"Ja. For all our complaining, I suppose that place wasn't all that bad. Even if the counselors were a fail, and the beds were awful. And so was the food." Gilbert made a face.

"Then what was not that bad?" Roderich looked at him, eyebrows raised.

"We had each other to keep ourselves company and to keep from going crazy~" Gilbert laughed.

"Well then." Roderich chuckled, and shook his head, "Nonetheless, sounds like a place to avoid at all costs."

"Ja, avoid it." Gilbert nodded, "Cuz otherwise it's going to be making the principal's job a living hell."

Roderich laughed, "You do that on a day-to-day basis!"

Gilbert grinned and slung an arm around Roderich's shoulder, and started walking slowly up the hallway, "Ja, well, I can do it even more then~"

Roderich shook his head, but didn't object to the arm that was now around him, "You're going to make his hair grow gray."

"You mean it isn't a wig yet?" Gilbert said in mock surprise.

Roderich laughed, unable to stop it, "No it isn't. And something tells me you already knew that."

"Ja, I did. I tried." Gilbert scoffed, "Totally thought it was a wig. He styles it weird."

"You tried…" Roderich stared at him in disbelief.

"Ja." Gilbert grinned, "I yanked on it when he was lecturing me for something."

"I imagine you got an even longer lecture." Roderich smiled.

"Waaaaay longer." Gilbert sighed, "Mein gott. He needs to learn how to summarize."

Roderich laughed and looked forward again. He spotted Arthur, Alfred, Allistor, and Reilly up ahead. He winced inwardly, he had almost forgotten about how he had reacted after the first assembly. At least Arthur was still here after all, he still had to apologize to him though.

"Yay~ so much better to be in this place!" Gilbert laughed, waving at them with his free hand while the other arm remained around Roderich's shoulders.

"Really?" Arthur asked, "Even with the blank-faced stiff of no emotion?"

"Mein gott …" Gilbert slumped, "I don't wanna deal with him…" Did someone have to remind him of that so soon?

Roderich patted Gilbert sympathetically on the back, remaining silent.

"Ja. Well you're dealing with it anyway."

Arthur peered around Allistor, "Oh that was bad timing. Leaving now." He quickly hurried back down the hall in the direction that Matthew and Cruz were still in.

"Wait for meeeee!" Alfred hurried after him, "Iggy~"

Gilbert and Roderich watched as Allistor and Reilly ran after him.

"Huh. Allistor runs faster than Alfred." Roderich commented.

"Ja. Wow." Gilbert blinked. He turned his head slightly and saw Regis with Ludwig and promptly stuck his tongue out at both of them, "Whatever. Just because I have to deal with it doesn't mean I have to be happy about it."

Roderich turned back towards the two blondes and made a face. He wasn't sure what to say, best to remain quiet in this situation. It was probably for the safer.

"Gilbert~"

Roderich raised an eyebrow as a silver-haired woman bounced past Regis and hugged Gilbert. He quickly sidestepped away before the hug so he didn't get caught in it.

"Hallo mutti." Gilbert sighed, patting her on the back.

"You weren't kidding." Roderich commented, looking away.

"Ja, really. You noticed it, too." Gilbert laughed.

"Noticed what?" Regis tilted his head.

"Two stiffs and two people who show actual emotion." Gilbert retorted, sticking his tongue out again.

"Hey!" Ludwig started, "I'm not a stiff!"

"Big Stiff." Gilbert pointed to Regis, "Und Little Stiff." Gilbert pointed to Ludwig.

"…" Regis and Ludwig stared at him in silence.

"He is taller though." Roderich commented.

"Ja. But he's shorter than vati." Gilbert commented dryly, glaring at Roderich, "And weren't you listening?"

"I was." Roderich laughed.

"But…Gilbert is older."

Gilbert looked at the female next to him, startled, "Seriously? Yay~ Little stiff!"

Ludwig sighed and hung his head, shaking it slightly.

"Never would have guessed that." Roderich raised an eyebrow.

"Whatever." Gilbert retorted to Roderich.

"Something tells me, it's going to get a lot louder at the house." Regis sighed.

"Oh great. Now I have to deal with them at home, too. Roddy~ I'm moving in~" Gilbert skipped over to Roderich.

Roderich turned red, "What?"

"No you are not!" Regis snapped, "You're living at home!"

Gilbert stuck his tongue out at Regis and hid behind Roderich, "Don't wanna."

"Is he this much of a child with you, Myla?" Regis looked over at the silver-haired female.

"Gilbert's a gentleman~" She smiled cheerfully.

"…excuse me. Two incompatible subjects just collided." Ludwig commented, walking away a bit.

"Whatever!" Gilbert yelled, "How rude!"

Roderich sighed and patted Gilbert on the shoulder, "It's alright. I'm sure you're a gentleman towards your mother."

"Ja, totally." Gilbert grinned, "That und mutti knows how to have fun unlike two stiffs."

"Hey." Regis glared at Gilbert, "When are you going to stop calling us that?"

"When you two stop being stiffs." Gilbert retorted.

"…do you two get along at all?" Ludwig asked, looking back and forth between them.

"No." Gilbert huffed.

Regis didn't answer, just glowered at Gilbert.

"This is going to be interesting at home…" Myla sighed, "Oh well~ nothing like a night of family bonding to help!"

"I AM NOT BONDING WITH THOSE TWO!" Gilbert recoiled in horror, "No way!"

"At least hesitate a little." Roderich looked back at Gilbert, surprised.

"No." Gilbert pouted.

.

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* * *

><p>So…there's the end of Awesome Style. You can imagine that they are fighting there in the hall for quite some time until the principal comes by and tells them they need to go to class. XD Leave me my final review! 8D<p>


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